


Been Looking So Long at My Pictures of You

by orphan_account



Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: And Wufei is an Asshole, Angst, But Quatre is a Cinnamon Roll, College AU, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, False Romantic Lead Trope, Friends With Benefits, Gundam Wing Rare Pair Big Bang 2016, Heero Yuy Needs a Hug, Heero Yuy is an Artist, M/M, One-Shot, Quatre is Spoiled, Rare Pairing, Smut, Starbucks, Studio Art Classes, lots of smut, sorry for that, the author is a horrible person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-29 01:17:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 32,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7664695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Of all the people Heero had to be paired up with for his mid-term art project, he never would have picked fussy, annoying Quatre Winner. Unfortunately, Quatre and his boyfriend came as a package deal, and the two of them were absolutely <i>sickening</i>.</p><p>Heero couldn’t wait for the semester to be over with so he could get on with his life.</p><p>Right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Been Looking So Long at My Pictures of You

**Author's Note:**

> This is my entry for the Gundam Wing Rare Pair Big Bang. I think of Heero and Quatre as a "rare pair" because I seldom see stories with a relationship between them as the main focus. And they really do seem like opposites to me.

"Y'know, now that we're outside in the sun and I have my shades on, I can really see the stains." Trowa nodded at Heero's work tee. "Nice look."

"Thanks for that," he muttered back. Trowa had caught up to him as he stalked across the quad on his way to the fine arts building. Trowa with his long legs easily matched Heero's rapid stride, sucking on a Starbucks iced coffee as he went.

"I thought you weren't working today."

"Noin called off sick, so I picked up a shift." And he had no time to change when they made him take the grill instead of the dish room carousel, and it took forever to brick it, scrape it, wipe it down and detail the crevices. Heero was spattered with grease and charcoal residue, face flushed from the heat of the kitchen, and his hair was plastered to his temples and his nape; what tied the look together, though, was the faint crease in his forehead from wearing his baseball cap, which he fished out of his pack now and put back on.

He'd been awake since five AM, and it wasn't helping his mood. His alarm had been set for six-thirty, so when Howard called him to see if he wanted to pick up the shift, he woke him out of a dead sleep. When Heero made his way there, parked his motorcycle, clocked in and tied up his apron, Howard eyed him sheepishly.

“We need you on grill. I already have coverage in the dish room.”

“My cup runneth over,” Heero snarled, but he didn’t give his lead any shit. Howard was a decent boss, giving Heero more hours than most of the students on the cafeteria’s roster because he was reliable. Heero was glad for once that he'd left his art folio in class the day before, hoping sorely that no one jacked any of his supplies from it. The Grumbacher pastel set cost a grip; replacing it meant he wouldn't eat that week. Leaving the folio at class was the lesser of two evils. Heero wasn't about to leave it in the cafeteria's disgusting locker room while he worked, not with his expensive drawing and vellum pads inside it. He'd caught one of the summer work training program students rifling through one of his drawing pads once while she was eating a handful of greasy chips on her break. That put the kibosh on that. "I can't even draw stick figures," she told him, mouth full and spraying crumbs everywhere. He knew he should have been flattered. More or less.

"Library later?" Trowa suggested. "Lower level by the references?" 

Heero scowled and made an aggrieved noise. Right. He had a project due for his history class. He dragged his feet dramatically, making Trowa chuckle and clap him on the back. "It'll be fun," Trowa assured him.

"You know I hate it when you _lie_."

"You _love_ writing ten-page term papers," Trowa lied again.

" _So_ much. _Fuck_ my life."

"Potty mouth," Trowa chided. "Look alive. Had any coffee yet?"

"No." Broke as he was, Heero was still a coffee snob, and the cafeteria only brewed Peet's, his least favorite. “I refuse to drink that swill.”

“I’ll buy you a Starbucks if you meet me at the library,” Trowa tempted. “Deal?”

Because of course he knew that a double mocha frap was Heero’s weakness. “Fine,” he growled. “And the lemon pound cake. Make it worth my while.”

"Don't I always?” Trowa’s smirk was scant but loaded. Heero flushed. Once upon a time, they’d been a thing. Trowa was funny, pragmatic, and honest, and if Heero was being honest with _himself_ , he was too much like _him._ The spark died after a few months once Heero realized that they were going through the motions, and it was difficult for him to admit one thing: He wanted someone who actually _needed_ him a little. Someone affectionate and who instigated things. Trowa… okay. Okay.

Trowa. He was the kind of guy who Heero would meet at home and ask “Wanna watch the fights at U-Bar?” and get a shrug for his trouble. Clubbing? Another shrug. An invitation to dinner and first choice of where they want? “Whatever you want.” It was fine that he was low maintenance…

…still. _Still_. Heero felt like he was doing all the work. So, maybe it was needy of _him_ , but once in a while, wasn’t it nice to be chased a little? Just a little?

They never even formally broke up. Heero merely started leaving Trowa’s apartment once they were finished watching their movie or eating their takeout or once the sheets began to cool and they ran out of conversation. Trowa took the unspoken hint and didn’t even call him out on it, per se. He never tried to convince him to stay. After a few weeks, while they were studying for an art history final, Heero found Trowa staring at him while he was highlighting his Xerox copies and jotting down his references. Heero frowned.

“What?” he murmured, mindful of the library technician peering at them over the rims of her bifocals as she sorted a rack of returned books.

“Are we done?” Trowa asked.

“Done with-“

“Done. Us.” Trowa threw up one hand in a gesture that didn’t need explaining, then plowed it through his hair, that thick mop of bangs that was forever draped over his eyes, which Heero still found kinda sexy, even though things had cooled. “I mean, you can tell me.”

“I… guess. I mean, it’s not like I _wanted_ it to be, but… yeah. Trowa, we were kinda just… we weren’t really going anywhere. It’s nice, spending time with you. I still enjoy hanging out. I just figured that you weren’t that serious about me. That were just having fun, but you didn’t seem like you thought it was fun anymore? Am I even close?”

Trowa sighed. Heero’s stomach twisted, and Trowa had a hard time meeting his eyes. Heero looked away, feigning interest in his notes and highlighter. He toyed with the cap, clicking it on, then off. On. Off. Click. Click. Click.

He finally set down the highlighter when the silence became oppressive. He went back to jotting down his references and only glanced up when Trowa pushed back his seat, scooped up his Jansport backpack and left. He felt desolate, resigned. 

He almost felt vindicated when Trowa texted him that night. 

_You were right._

Heero lied to himself later that evening, as he was making dinner, that it was the onions he was chopping that were making his eyes spark.

They stayed friends. Maybe better friends than they were before they hooked up. That led them here. Trowa was a great study partner, always armed with caffeine and gum, taking excellent notes, quizzing Heero on the parts of the lecture that he missed to keep him sharp. They still went out and shot darts and pool, guzzled indecent amounts of coffee at the hole-in-the-wall cafes around town, compensated for it in beer on the weekends, and had the kinds of conversations people had when they weren’t in a relationship, that they weren’t brave enough to have when they were still in the stages of wanting to impress each other.

“Janeway was a better captain than Picard or Kirk.”

“Shut your lying mouth. Oh, my God, I can’t _even_ with you right now.”

 

So, they carried on, very good friends who still occasionally grilled each other as to _why_ with incredulity, snark, and extreme prejudice. Trowa shoved the last of his drink at Heero. “Want the rest? I’m sick of it.”

“All that’s left is slush,” Heero complained as he examined Trowa’s depleted plastic cup with its green straw and domed lid, fragments of caramel still clinging to the rim.

“It’s caffeinated slush. Here. Take it.” He had a point. Heero took it, popped off the lid, and tossed back the rest. It would have to do. He would _need_ caffeine to get through his Drawing 2A class. 

Especially when he had to deal with _him_. Heero felt his annoyance mounting. He chucked the cup, and Trowa pulled him in for a one-armed hug. “Buck up. Catch you for lunch.”

“I might just go home to bed.” Working in the kitchen sometimes robbed Heero of his appetite. After having to clean the grill and empty out the grease traps in the floor, spelling the stale, blackened grease as it wafted up to his face, he never even wanted to _look_ at food.

“Text me, anyway.”

“That’s fine.” 

“Don’t be late.” Trowa waved him off, and Heero’s sigh was gritty as he headed upstairs to his classroom and studio, down the hall, last door on the left. He arrived just as the professor was loading a laptop presentation. He nodded to a couple of his classmates. Relena waved him over to sit on the stool beside her, which he was fine with; Relena Darlian was one of the girls who lived in the sorority house down the block from his duplex, owner of a bubbly laugh and a pro at beer pong.

Dr. Johnson glanced at him and huffed as he took the proffered stool. “Wasn’t sure you’d make it.”

“It was a near thing,” he told him. That earned him a smirk.

“Okay. So, now that we’re all here,” he said pointedly, “I’m going to show you a little of what we’re going to be working on for your mid-term project. Full-body portraits of your classmate.”

“Oooo-kay,” Relena muttered under her breath.

“ _Clothed_ portraits.”

There were a few chuckles and sighs of relief around the room. 

“Get your minds out of the gutter. So, these are a few photos from about the past five semesters. These portraits get mounted and hung in the library in time for the art show display. You will each be choosing a partner out of my magic Sorting Hat,” Dr. Johnson joked, and Heero snorted when he held up a flamboyantly purple velvet wizard’s cap appliqued with gold moons and stars. “I borrowed this from the theater department. You and your drawing partner will draw full-size portraits of each other. These will be drawn in charcoal and pastel. These can be simple standing poses or action poses, if you’re feeling that creative. I don’t want these purposely abstract. No caricatures or cartoon-style. Draw these out as realistically as you feel you can manage, using the tools and techniques you’ve learned this semester so far.” 

The slide show began, and Heero examined the works as Dr. Johnson zoomed in on some of them, frame by frame. Some of them were beautifully drawn, careful attention given to hair, features, fastenings on clothing, and expressions. Gestures were very articulate looking, some pretty deliberate. Heero recognized his old philosophy professor raising a Starbucks cup as though he was toasting him, and the goth girl who he always saw at the music store three blocks from campus, ear gages and all. He noted and elderly looking re-entry student holding a companion dog, sporting a straw hat with pink silk flowers. Her face was drawn with care, with laugh lines around her eyes and mouth, but not so pronounced as to be unflattering. Dr. Johnson pointed that out.

“Respect your subject. Respect your classmates. Don’t make them feel badly with your finished product. Check in with each other frequently. This is the perfect opportunity to get to know each other if you haven’t. You’re going to take photos. Using your smartphones will be fine. Be mindful of lighting. I want you to pay attention to your light source and direction as you draw. I want you to pay attention to foreshortening. Shadows. Contours. Negative space. We’re creating the illusion of three dimensions with your flat piece of drawing paper.”

He clicked through the drawing slides, and Heero sighed. It wasn’t the worst assignment in the world, certainly. It was just going to be time-consuming, and if he had to admit it, he wasn’t always a “team player” when it came to group projects. That was why he and Trowa tended to work well together; they communicated, but they were still independent. _I’ll wash, you dry._ Simple.

Dr. Johnson stopped lecturing at the sound of a sharp tenor voice in the hall, and Heero saw the silhouette of a familiar blond head of hair through the smoked glass pane of the classroom door. He groaned under his breath, and Relena elbowed him.

“Stop it,” she whispered. “Be nice.”

“Nooooooo,” he whined. “Make the bad man go away.”

Her blue eyes twinkled in amusement, and he earned himself a twitch of her lips. “Don’t make me get you two a get-along shirt.”

And with that, the door swung open, and Quatre backed into the studio, still chatting on the phone. “I know. I know that. I’ll meet you at the quad after class. I know. Drawing. You saw me walk out with my portfolio, dork!” Heero heard his chuckle, sweet as honey – or it would be, if the sound of Quatre Winner’s voice didn’t grate on his nerves, even on the best of days.

“I know. Love you.” He made a kissy noise and then ended the call, then turned to take the last empty seat, nodding to the professor.

“Nice of you to make it,” he drawled. “You’re late, Winner.” A silent ripple of smirks went around the room. Yes, it was his last name, but Dr. Johnson’s tone left little argument as to what he was thinking and how he felt about having his lecture interrupted by a tardy arrival. “I take it the dork was someone losing lecture points for?” Relena leaned forward, pretending to prop her jaw against her curled palm, but Heero saw her chest shaking and elbowed her, this time. They raised their eyebrows at each other.

 _Jackass_ , he mouthed.

 _I know,_ she mouthed back. 

Neither of them had much patience for Quatre, as a rule. The blond just smiled. “Sorry,” he offered, like he hadn’t just disrupted the lesson of the day for a phone call. A _mushy_ phone call.

Dr. Johnson concluded the slide show and turned off the laptop. “All right.” He scrubbed his hands together. “Let’s take a crack at the hat! Pass it around. If you get your own name, toss it back in. We have an even number of people, so everyone gets a partner.” Heero hoped he could just pair up with Relena. She was a decent artist and wasn’t likely to make him look that ridiculous.

“No peeking. Pick a name. Pass it on. The hat comes back to me once you all have your partner.”

“Great,” Relena murmured.

“Going to peek?” Heero suggested.

“Might have to,” she pointed out. 

Dr. Johnson heard them. “No peeking!” he reminded them again. And the hat went ‘round, and names were called out with each selection. Each person called raised their hand, and they paired up. Relena chatted with Heero about his shift at the cafeteria that morning, admitting that she didn’t even want to know what his shirt was stained with, and that he smelled a bit like bacon, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but yes, _bacon_ , when her name was suddenly called.

“Lena, you’re with me,” Dorothy called out.

“Yay!” Relena cheered back before shrugging at Heero. “Sorry,” she told him.

“No harm, no foul,” he replied.

And then he was handed the hat. There were several names left, but almost all of the pairs were selected. Heero reached inside the silky interior of the hat, noticing that it smelled like mothballs, and he unfolded the scrap of paper.

_Fuuuuuuuuck._

“Seriously?” he murmured under his breath. He fought the sigh threatening to burst from his chest. “Quatre,” he called out.

That made the blond look up sharply – guiltily – from his cell phone, where he was typing a rapid-fire message on the enormous Samsung screen with a dopey smile. “Huh?” he asked, face going blank for a moment.

“You and me,” Heero told him, voice a bit flat. He would blame it on the lack of caffeine. Fight him on that. He was sticking to his story. “Partners.”

“Oh. Wait. For the drawings?”

“You heard the man, Mr. Winner,” Dr. Johnson added. “The Sorting Hat has spoken! It’s another match made in heaven. Make beautiful art together.” The last unpaired student took a name and handed him back the hat. 

“Make sure you get his good side,” Relena whispered.

“Shut up.”

*

The class finished up with two-minute and five-minute gesture drawings, and then Dr. Johnson had them try a practice rough sketch of each other’s faces. Heero went first, and Quatre sat across from him, phone thankfully put away. He sat bolt upright on his stool, posture graceful and hands tucked in his lap. He stared directly at Heero as he sketched, which unnerved him a little.

To his credit, he was cute.

Quatre was taller than Heero by a couple of inches, lean and toned. His skin was fair and unblemished. Heero never saw him unshaven, not so much as a lick of stubble. He was a natural towhead blond – so untypical of an adult, and it gave him a boyish look – who never had a hair out of place; he used expensive hair product and his whole look screamed “boy band.” He had patrician features and cerulean blue eyes with enviably long, dark lashes. Heero was convinced that he whitened his teeth. Heero focused mainly on his face as his charcoal vine moved across the paper, but he took in other details, like his slim wrists and long fingers with perfectly clean nails, the silver rings on his fingers; he had one on his index finger that Heero hadn’t noticed before, impractical, but it worked on him.

Quatre’s lips twitched, and Heero frowned. He wasn’t going to let him get a good study of his mouth. Why wasn’t that a surprise?

“What’s that all over your shirt?”

“Grill grease, and pretty much everything you ate for breakfast, if it was at the cafeteria,” Heero admitted, voice flat as he continued to sketch. He was looking at his pad, trying to capture the little shadow beneath Quatre’s nose.

Quatre gave him a disbelieving look, then huffed. “Oh, God, I never eat there.”

“Must be nice.” Heero was on a shoestring budget. If he didn’t eat his meal on his shift, then it was ramen and cereal.

“I mean… if you cook there, that’s fine. I’m not talking shit about you if you do, y’know?”

“Sure.” Heero mentally rolled his eyes. He was still wearing his baseball cap, and he hoped it helped shield his expression a little.

“I just care about what I put into my body,” Quatre explained, even though Heero hadn’t asked. “Garbage in, garbage out.”

 _Jesus_.

And now that Quatre started talking, he didn't want to stop. "I'd hate to have to work right before class."

“It happens.”

“I work at my father’s company between semesters. It’s nice to not have to worry about having enough time to study. Or for other things.” He gave Heero a knowing smile, and he suppressed the urge to throw down his charcoal, cram his sketch pad into his folio and run screaming from the classroom if he had to listen to him for even one moment to hear him talk about-

“Wufei takes up a lot of my time.”

_Fuuuuuuuuuuuck._

“Bet he does.”

“That’s who I was on the phone with earlier.”

“Figured as much.”

“Are you always this monosyllabic?”

“No.” Maybe. Heero tried to focus on the soft skritch of the charcoal against the paper and the shadows as they took shape. It wasn’t bad for a rough, so far, but he really needed a photo of Quatre as a proper reference. Preferably when he wasn’t running his mouth to throw off his angle or distract him. Heero ignored Quatre’s smile.

“Okay.”

“Okay. Your turn, I guess. If you want.”

“Can I see?” Quatre scooted off his stool and came to stand by Heero, peering over his shoulder at the sketch pad. Heero’s nose twitched; Quatre was wearing an herbal scented cologne with notes of sandalwood in it. He reached out and touched the paper, holding the edge of the drawing by the lower corner, one of Heero’s peeves, but he bit his tongue. “Wow. That’s… yeah, that’s me.” He sounded impressed.

Heero felt a warm tingle rise up his neck at his proximity, and he suppressed a little shiver. “Somewhat.”

Quatre ducked his face, then grinned at Heero through his bangs. “You’re a better artist than me. You know that, right? I could end up drawing you all jacked up.”

“Yeah. Well. Sounds fun. I guess.”

“Hey, let me do a practice run, too, then,” Quatre decided. He gave Heero’s upper arm a small pat, and Heero was stunned at the touch. He waited for Quatre to dig out his sketch pad, a pricey Bristol bound in spiral wire. Quatre opted for a 4B pencil and beckoned for Heero to sit.

“Just relax, okay. Hey, could you take off the hat?”

“I’d kinda rather not.”

“It’s okay if your hair’s all jacked,” Quatre assured him. “I just need to see your whole face.”

“Sure you don’t want to just wait until we can take some pictures?” Heero _really_ didn’t want to remove his cap; he could still feel himself sweating and he knew his hair was going to be plastered unbecomingly to his temples and flying up in five directions on the back.

“I just want to get a handle on sketching your face,” Quatre insisted. “Go ahead and take it off before we run out of time!”

Heero rolled his eyes without restraint, not giving a damn about tact, and his sigh was just as loud. Quatre smirked in triumph when he took off the hat.

“Wow. Hat hair. Impressive.”

“Fuck off.”

Quatre’s eyes grew round, and Heero saw Relena out of the corner of his eyes choking on a laugh, since she heard the rancor in his voice. 

“Right. So just hold still. I’ll shut up. Promise.”

Heero relaxed his shoulders and decided he didn’t feel like looking at Quatre at the moment. He stared off at two of the older re-entry students in the corner, chatting about the project and their grandchildren’s antics. He heard Quatre’s slow, soft scratches against the sketch pad; the strokes sounded deliberate rather than loose, and Heero wanted to tell him _You’re trying too hard_ without having seen the picture so far. That would be unkind, he decided, so he remained silent.

He still felt a small chill running through him. He felt Quatre's eyes scanning his face, and he felt a flush rise all the way up to the tops of his ears. He heard periodic erasures from the blond’s page, and he figured it might be unsettling for him, too, sitting at such close range to his subject. Quatre scribbled, making the occasional thoughtful noise, then cursing under his breath. Heero wanted to laugh, but he mastered it.

“God, this is gonna be so hard,” Quatre exclaimed under his breath. “I’m not good with faces.”

“So, practice.”

“I just have things that I suck at.”

“So, work on them.” 

“I know, but… turn a teeny bit the way you just turned from. Sorry.” Heero sighed and obeyed. “I could have let you keep the hat on, but I like seeing your face. I couldn’t see your eyes that well before.”

“That’s fine.”

“They’re… really, uh. Blue.”

Heero huffed. “So I’ve heard.”

“Have you ever worn eyeliner?”

That made Heero shake off his pose while he laughed. “God, no. Not my style.”

“You might rock it.” Quatre grinned at this time, and Heero knew he was just giving him a hard time. “But, y’know. Sweaty hat hair is the look you’ve got going now, so. Maybe eyeliner would be out.”

Heero wanted to swat him with his sketchbook. So badly.

Doctor Johnson called time. “All right. We’re done for the day. Share your info with your partner. By next class, I expect good working photos in good light. Try taking them in the afternoon. Full-length pose, and then take a close-up of their face at the same angle. That will help you when you begin to work in details. Remember, this is an important project for your grade, but it’s also going up in the library.”

“That’s not putting any pressure on us,” Quatre muttered, and Heero almost – but not quite – felt sympathy for him. 

“So, can I see it?” he mentioned. 

Quatre flushed. “Oh. No. Maybe not. It’s not great.”

“It can’t be _that_ bad?”

_Then again…_

Okay. It was a little rough. Quatre was drawing a three-quarter view of his face, but he made it look really, really narrow, and his far eye looked a little off. Was Heero scowling that much?

Quatre looked sheepish. “Maybe you could still switch with someone else,” he said softly. Before Heero could reassure him, Quatre added “I can’t help it if you’re funny looking.”

“Wha- HEY!”

Quatre held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay! Bullshitting with you. Sorry. I’ll do better. I’ll try to make it at least look a little like you.”

“Famous last words,” Heero groused. He sighed. “You almost got my nose right.”

“Right? I kinda nailed it. Hey, did you know it’s a teensy bit crooked?”

Geez…

“Just give me your number. I’ll get in touch with you when you want to do pictures. Preferably not right after I’ve worked.”

They punched each other’s info into their phones, and Heero saved Quatre’s contact under “Annoying Asshole.”

Heero mashed his cap back onto his hair and beat feet, not wanting to spend any more time in the blond’s company if he didn’t have to, but just as he made it out into the corridor, Quatre called him back.

“Heero, have you met ‘Fei?”

_Ohhhh, great._

Because of course he had to meet the man who made Quatre disrupt class with his mushy goo-goo phone calls and texts. Heero wanted to claim that he had to hurry to class, but he forced his face into civil lines.

 _Of course_ Quatre’s boyfriend was perfectly groomed. Amused dark eyes raked over Heero, and he reached out a slender hand for him to shake, but the gesture was hesitant, as though he wasn’t certain Heero wouldn’t contaminate him. “Heero?” he inquired.

“Heero Yuy.”

“Oh. Okay.” His grip was almost too firm once he was introduced, and Heero longed to squeeze back enough for it to smart, just to be an ass. “Chang Wufei.”

“I call him ‘Fei,” Quatre explained, and he had a sappy, fawning expression, hand threaded through the crook of his arm.

“Is this your major?” Wufei asked, and Heero sensed a hint of disdain in his tone.

“Pretty much.”

“Hn.” Wufei shrugged, then turned to Quatre. “Still want to get something to eat?”

“You know I do,” Quatre claimed, tightening his grip on him possessively. “You said you were going to meet me at the quad.”

“I was in the neighborhood,” Wufei told him simply. “So, let’s eat.”

“Anywhere but the cafeteria,” Heero reminded Quatre, who snorted.

“Exactly,” he confirmed, and Heero wanted to kick him.

“It’s not that bad,” Wufei argued.

Heero was slightly mollified.

“If you _like_ ptomaine,” he added dryly.

Never mind. He could fuck off.

“I have somewhere I have to be.” Heero was done with introductions at that point, and he just wanted to go home to his bed. He saw Relena walking past them. She caught his eye and mimed sticking her finger down her throat. Heero choked back a snicker. Wufei gave him an odd look. “Have a nice lunch.” _Choke on it, you smug bastards_.

“Call me! Or just text me,” Quatre called after him.

“That’s fine,” Heero shot back as he loped off. He heard Wufei’s voice, annoyed and confused.

“Why do you have to call him?”

“We have a project. C’mon, let’s go eat.”

Heero heard their conversation die off the further he got from them, Quatre’s perky tone mingling with Wufei’s more subdued questions. Wufei was handsome enough, and he could see why Quatre would be drawn to him physically, but they just seemed like they had very little in common. Quatre always seemed concerned with appearances, which was bad enough, but Wufei just seemed like an arrogant prick. Heero didn’t have time for that nonsense in his life.

And he would be stuck elbow to elbow with Quatre, working on their project for the next month.

Oh, joy.

*

Trowa got home and slapped his portfolio on the dining room table that was already cluttered with opened mail and text books. He kicked off his shoes, jerked off his cap and ran his fingers through his greasy hair. God, he couldn’t wait to take a shower. Heero headed for his room and shucked his clothes, dropping them directly into the hamper. He retrieved the damp bath towel that was still lying in a heap on his bedroom floor and took it with him to the bathroom. He needed to clean it, he noticed, taking a stale whiff. In the meantime, he turned on the shower dials, cranking up the hot tap until the bathroom filled with steam. Heero hissed at the sensation of the hot spray hitting his back at first, but as he accustomed himself to it, it began to soothe his aching muscles. He hated bricking the grill. He hated always smelling like secondhand chicken grease and fries. But the worst part was not having enough time to study when he had to keep his job to afford his art supplies, lab fees, books and cell phone bill every month.

He squeezed out a scant handful of all-in-one shampoo/shower gel, hearing the plastic bottle make farting noises to tell him that it was almost empty. Great. One more thing that he could barely afford to add to his shopping list. Heero slicked it through his hair, working the lather through his hair to rid it of the sweat and grime. It felt like he was wearing a layer of it all over, like a coat. Runnels of foam ran down his body, and he watched it drizzle down the drain in long white streams as he leaned forward, hands against the tile. It felt so good to relax and get his equilibrium back. His circadian rhythms were thrown off by the early morning. He would no doubt take a long nape, then be unable to sleep at night. It figured. _Thanks, Howard._

Suddenly Heero heard his bathroom door click open, the sound sharp and accompanied by a rush of cool air from the corridor, and he saw Trowa’s tall, slim silhouette through the sheer plastic curtain. “SHIT!” But it sent his heart pounding anyway. He’d forgotten Trowa still had a key.

“I’m sorry,” Trowa offered. He chuckled. “Did I scare you?”

“What do you think?” 

“I said I was sorry.”

“Next time, tell me you’re coming over. I thought we were just gonna study.”

“We are.” Trowa leaned against the edge of the sink. “We still can.”

“Okay.”

“Did you just get in there?”

“Yes.”

“Gonna be a while?”

“Probably.” Heero tipped his head back into the spray to rinse, and the water felt heavenly flowing over his scalp. He closed his eyes and exhaled long and slow.

“Want me to wash your back?”

Heero’s eyes snapped open.

He pushed back the edge of the shower curtain and peered out at him, and Trowa’s expression was hopeful. Heero felt himself crack. He swallowed, licking his lips.

“If. If you, uh, if you want.”

He turned up the water, which had cooled from “lava” to “reheated soup” and tried not to stare at Trowa as he undressed. Heero continued to rinse his hair and knead his sore neck; leaning over a grill and scrubbing it til he thought his arm would fall off always jacked it up. He heard Trowa’s clothings dropping with soft thuds onto the linoleum and his shoes being kicked off, and Heero moved aside when he heard the low hiss of the shower curtain rings sliding across the pole. Trowa let in a draft of cool air with his entry, but he closed the curtain quickly. Heero turned to face him, and it made his stomach clench at the sight of him. Trowa was exquisite, and Heero told himself that he was treading foolish ground right now, because they had done this before, and what had it gotten them? But it was Trowa, long and lean and sculpted, his touch so familiar as he drew Heero in and tipped his face up to his teasing kiss. Heero shivered with want, then claimed Trowa’s mouth hungrily, robbing the taller brunette of breath. It had been too long, and Heero had needs that were hard to ignore. Trowa’s arms snaked around his waist, and he ground against Heero while he explored his mouth in hot, greedy strokes. Heero made a sound of need, so filled with want, and his fingers tangled in Trowa’s hair, growing steadily damper as the spray hit it. 

They wasted the rest of the shampoo gel, and Heero let Trowa massage him – washing his back, he called it, how cute was that? - _everywhere_. And it was good, oh, _so_ good, and Trowa knew all of his sensitive places, how Heero strained against him when he kissed that perfect spot on his neck. His hands were slick with soap as they ran over his skin, gripping him against him and kneading Heero’s ass. Heero groaned into Trowa’s mouth, and Trowa headed south, tongue swirling down between his collarbones, lapping at his nipples in lazy spirals, and Heero grew hard as a rock. He was twitching, straining for Trowa to give his cock some attention. Trowa’s palms ran down over his ribs, gripping his hips as he sank to his knees, and Heero leaned back against the shower tile in anticipation. Trowa opened his mouth and breathed over the rosy, tumescent head of his cock, then let his tongue caress it in a hot, velvety stroke. Heero arched into it and cried out. Trowa continued to tease him, hands holding him firmly still as he had his way with him.

He only took Heero halfway where he wanted to go, letting his mouth slip off with a pop, then ducked down to lap briefly at his balls just to give Heero a hard time. “Not fair,” he hissed. “Damn it, Trowa. Get back on it.”

“Uh-uh. Then you’ll come.”

“That’s the point!”

“C’mon, Heero. Bed. I’ll dry you off.”

Heero reluctantly slapped down the shower plunger, and then turned off the dials, and Trowa hurried him out of the tub. He began drying Heero off, taking all sorts of liberties, lapping up beads of water from his throat, shoulders, licking a line down his spinal column, and Heero leaned forward, heels of his hands against the sink. His hips tilted back, and Trowa grinned as he followed the water droplets down Heero’s crease-

-before he chased them with his _tongue_.

“You could’ve kept this in the shower,” Heero reminded him, voice raspy and strained. He felt the warm, teasing probe of Trowa’s tongue stroking him, and he arched back into it.

“You always get sleepy after a long shower,” Trowa told him briefly before he went back to his task. He pulled long, loud cries from him as he opened him up, and Heero reached down to touch himself, grip unsteady. 

“Oh, that’s the reason why you had me get out?” he huffed. Trowa reached up and swatted Heero’s hand away, and he gripped it against Heero’s thigh while he continued to rim him. Heero saw himself in the mirror, skin rosy and beaded with water, hair slick and gleaming, and his eyes were half-shuttered and filled with lust. Heero wished he could see Trowa, wished he would watch him work, but he focused on the feel of him, of the low sound of his breathing and low hums of contentment. He had Heero squirming and hot and going out of his mind for the next few minutes. He was already leaking from the tip, dribbling a little onto the sink porcelain.

"Lube’s in the bedroom,” Heero grated out. Trowa nodded behind him, humming in agreement, and Heero shuddered. The stroke of Trowa’s tongue was already undoing him, felt so good, but Heero wanted to be claimed, hard and rough. Trowa groaned at having to stop, nipping Heero’s ass cheek in umbrage before he rose and led him to the bedroom.

Heero had the fleeting thought that he really needed to wash his sheets soon as he clambered back onto his bed, Trowa situating himself between his thighs. Heero handed him the bottle of AstroGlide and shuddered when Trowa’s slick finger teased him, right before sliding inside with an experimental twist. Heero was leaning back on his elbows, watching him.

“You’re so tight,” Trowa pointed out.

“Yeah. Guess that happens.” Heero clenched around the intrusive digit, hinting at what was to come and proving Trowa’s claim.

Trowa’s eyes were dark with passion. He kissed a line down his groin while his hand worked, and Heero’s head tipped back when those firm lips found his sac. It had been so long since his body benefitted from so much attention, even though he knew this was just a fluke. Tomorrow morning, their conversations would be lukewarm, safe. Detached. Trowa would still be his friend, Heero would still be single and not inclined to rush into anything else with anyone else, and that was just his life sorted, wasn’t it?

Trowa found his sweet spot, took ruthless advantage of it, turning him into a squirming mess before he entered Heero, and proceeded to fuck him into the mattress. Heero hoped his neighbors were all at class, the thought fleeting as he shouted down the walls of his tiny bedroom. Trowa’s body was as lean and hard as he remembered it, his broad shoulders easily supporting Heero’s knees, narrow hips snapping forward in sharp, efficient shunts. He came with Trowa buried deep inside him, spurting over his closed fist. Trowa cleaned his hand off on Heero’s discarded work shirt, certainly not the worst of the stains decorating it, and he finished himself off, rocking inside of Heero until his climax warmed his insides.

They lay together for a minute, and it was awkward, even though they were both exhausted. Heero stroked Trowa’s hair absently, then huffed when Trowa rose, abrupt and stiff.

“We still need to go to the library. Go ahead and get dressed.”

_Jesus._

Heero gave himself a few seconds before he rolled and sat up. “Give me a few minutes to recharge my phone and find some clean underwear.”

No pillow talk. No praise. No “I’ll call you laters.” No lazy kisses, afterglow or staring into each other’s eyes.

To Heero, it just felt like such a cop-out.

*

They studied for three hours at the library. Trowa suggested dinner, but Heero begged off, needing some time to himself.

“I have to go do laundry.” He thought of his sheets, still smelling like Trowa, and it chafed. “I might just throw together a sandwich and call it good.”

“Sure? We could do pizza?”

“I’m not really in the mood for pizza.” Trowa sighed.

“That’s fine.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” Heero gathered up his backpack quickly before they could continue a real conversation that would likely go nowhere. Their passion from the afternoon was at such odds with who they were when they both had their clothes on.

“Later,” Trowa replied as he lunged up from his seat, pack already dangling by its strap from one shoulder, and his long strides left Heero in his dust. Nothing like that last word, Heero thought bitterly.

Heero ended up “faking” some soup, boiling the last of a bag of noodles and throwing the rest of his vegetables (a few brittle baby carrots, the last third of an onion, and a potato with a bad spot in it so deep that he had to cut off half of the spud itself) into a pot with some chicken broth and a little leftover cooked ground beef. It wasn’t great, but now he wouldn’t have to listen to his stomach growl. He was just reaching into the cupboard for the pepper, when his phone buzzed from the counter. Heero unplugged the charging cable and walked it back toward the stove.

_Annoying Asshole. Accept Call? Decline Call?_

Heero sighed as he hit the green circle with his thumb. “This is Heero.”

“Um, hey. It’s me, from art class. Calling to see when you want to get together for photos?” His voice sounded eager, yet uncertain.

Heero closed his eyes. Shit. He’d forgotten.

“We could have done that earlier today. I’m sorry, I was just busy.”

“No, that’s okay. I was busy, anyway. ‘Fei took me out to eat, and then we went to the mall, so it’s not like I had a lot of time to work on this with you.”

“Yeah.” Heero stirred his soup. “How about tomorrow?”

“Oh, good. You don’t want to squeeze it in today. That’s a relief.”

“It’s too late. We’ll have better light tomorrow.”

“Okay, so three is good for me-“

“I work at three,” Heero cut in. 

“Ooh. Wow. Okay.” Heero threw up his hand, glad that the blond couldn’t see him. “Yeah. I don’t have a great window at any other time than that.”

“We need to work on a window, or we won’t have a photo,” Heero reasoned. “What _does_ your day look like?” He knew he would hate himself for asking.

“Oh, it’s busy as heck,” Quatre assured him. “I have my geology class. It’s kinda my favorite. That’s a nine o’clock lecture, and then I have my Middle Eastern Studies at eleven. I usually go to my gym for my block with my personal trainer at twelve, so I can’t move that around.”

“Course not,” Heero agreed, voice bland as his soup.

“Then I have to meet up with ‘Fei. We’re going shopping for a shirt for him. He’s going to be in his sister’s wedding,” Quatre gushed, and that was the last thing Heero wanted to hear about. Weddings made him itch. Talk of weddings made him check his watch and duck out of the conversation, claiming that he had to hurry home and let his dog out, even though his apartment didn’t even allow them. 

“So, are you thinking you will be done by three?” Heero attempted.

“Oh. Well, I just figured we could work something in around then.”

“Look. Could we just book a minute to do this before you meet up with him? Or even on your way to meet him? I don’t really care. I just want to get this done.” Heero knew he sounded grouchy, but he didn’t care. He was hungry, tired, and still coasting on the fumes of his afternoon with Trowa, frustrated at the state of things. And the state of things that _weren’t_.

Quatre made a huffy noise, tsking. “Well, I can _try_. It’s just hard, Heero. I want to get this done, too, but you’re going to have to work with me. I can’t help it if I have a busy day.”

Heero sighed through his nose, mentally counting to three. “Right. Okay. Again, just let me meet with you on your way to meet ‘Fei, because I can’t be late for work, and by the time my shift ends, all the light will be gone. Okay? I want to get decent pictures for both of us to use as a reference. I know you’re not looking forward to the project, Quatre, I really do. A good photo will make all the difference.”

“Don’t wear that hat. Promise,” Quatre told him, and Heero heard Quatre’s vapid smile in his voice. It irked him.

“I. Promise. Just. Meet. Me.”

“That’s fine. Okay, it’s no big deal. I’ll just tell ‘Fei that we are meeting you for a minute. He’ll be fine with it, I guess.”

Why _wouldn’t_ he be? Heero wondered. “Okay. So, around 2:30? Like, at the quad?”

“How about at the park? I hope it’s not out of your way, but I just like the park for photos. The light might be nice there?” Heero would have preferred the campus rose garden, but he shrugged.

“That would work. By the creek side.”

“Ooh. Yes.” Quatre sounded more enthusiastic. “That sounds great! Okay. Creek side. Two-thirty. That’s our plan?”

“That’s our plan.”

“Sweet! Now I’m kinda looking forward to it! I just wish we could have done this on a day where I already went to the tanning bed, but you can’t have everything, right?”

Heero wanted to shoot himself.

“The lighting might work well with your skin if you’re still fair,” Heero offered, in an attempt to be nice.

“You’re totally lying, but thank you. I’m fish-belly pale,” Quatre laughed, but he decided to let Heero off the hook. “Okay. Two-thirty. Me and ‘Fei will be there with bells on.” Then he had a thought. “What should I wear?”

“Just, something comfortable, I guess. Jeans. A nice tank top in a bright color. Just something that shows the lines of your body and that looks like ‘you.’”

“Could I wear black?”

“You could, but the gradients of shadow will look better if you wear a color.”

“This is why you’re the better artist,” Quatre laughed. “Duh! What am I thinking?”

“Colored shirt,” Heero told him. “See you tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

Heero rang off before Quatre could say anything else.

*

 

Heero managed to make it through his morning art history class. Trowa merely nodded at him as he took his seat, and that told him all he needed to know about their current footing. The lecture was unremarkable, and it found him scribbling in the margins of his notes, peering around at his desk neighbors and seeing that they were all doing the same. Art majors. Typical. He saw random cartoony doodles, facial studies, geometric scribbles, and what looked like the schematic for a motherboard. Duo was the only computer studies major in his class, taking art history to get his upper division humanities requirement out of the way. Duo grinned at him, nodding a brief “what’s up?” before he went back to his scribble. Heero stared at him for an indulgent minute while he was facing away. Duo Maxwell would have been fun to draw. He was beautifully built, all ropey muscle and sinew. Heero often found him skateboarding around the back parking lots and pretty much outside of any building that featured steps with rails. Duo really _was_ “fishbelly-pale” and had chestnut brown hair flowing down his back, braided up in a snug plait with long, messy bangs. Heero wished he could get out his charcoals and sketch him shirtless, just a detailed anatomy study of all those graceful contours and angles. But he worked with him at the cafeteria, he was happily dating someone already, and it would be weird if he asked. Duo also had the most amazing eyes, a deep blue with hints of violet with dark, thick lashes, mischief living in their depths. It was fun to look at him. And to listen to him, for that matter, since Duo was a hot mess. Only Duo could rationalize that going for two days with the power out in his apartment was worth it after using his monthly utility payment to buy Coachella tickets.

Duo usually worked as a “swamper” in the cafeteria, filling dispensers and changing out soda syrup boxes in the basement, stocking the coffee urns, milk pumps, soft serve machine, cocoa dispensers, salad bar, and napkins and utensils. He was a people person and slightly hyper; that suited him more than working in the back with the dish carousel, washing pots by hand, or bricking the grill (where Heero was practically shackled). 

Their professor wrapped up the lecture with a reminder that their mid-term exam was next Friday, and that the slide presentations were available on the student portal for review. Heero would rather spend his time working on that than dealing with his new drawing partner, but what could you do?

He took extra time with his appearance, deciding that he needed to take his own advice. Heero actually used a little styling product on his hair and put on some dark gray skinny jeans and a jade green tank top. He left in his eyebrow ring and small silver ear gages, and he added a small silver hoop to the topmost hole in his left ear. It had taken over a year to heal and to stop stinging every time he laid on it or accidentally scraped it with his comb or hat, but it was his favorite piercing now, easily an erogenous zone whenever anyone nipped him there. Heero also shaved, deciding the “scruffy” look would present Quatre with the additional problem of drawing him with stubble. Heero hoped that Quatre wouldn’t need a lot of babysitting with this project. Then again, maybe he would just throw together a half-assed big sketch, color inside the lines, sign it and turn it in without another thought. 

Duo caught him in the corridor. “You cleaned up nice. This isn’t the whole ‘just fell out of bed’ look, for a change. Got a coffee date?”

“Pfft. No. Just meeting a guy from drawing class for a project.”

“Ooh. Is he single?”

“No. And thank God. I wouldn’t wish that guy on anyone else.”

“Awwww! That’s not nice.”

“He’s just so…” Heero made a face. Duo laughed.

“Your eyebrows said it all.”

“We have to draw each other.”

Duo smirked. “Nakey?”

“NO!”

Duo snickered. “Where’s the fun in that?”

“There’s none to be had. Trust me. I just wish I could have been paired up with Relena, since she can actually draw, and since she isn’t a pain in my ass.”

“Well, not everybody can draw,” Duo pointed out. “Go easy on him. Is he at least cute?”

“Yes. It’s about his only redeeming quality.”

“Fair enough. Can’t have it all. See you at work,” Duo told him as he loped off, and the sunshine hit his hair as he left the shadows of the stairwell overhang, bringing out auburn glints in all that hair, and Heero wished again that he could just draw Duo for his project. The bulletin board in the back office of the cafeteria was full of candid photos of the students on staff, and Duo photo-bombed every single one of them with his goofy grin, duck faces and mock gang signs. Heero sighed.

The walk to the creek was pleasant enough, warm and breezy, a good day to wear no sleeves. Heero treated himself to a quick iced coffee and sugared it generously, then followed the sidewalk flow of people toward the park. When he arrived there, the bike racks were full, and he saw locals flying kites and having impromptu picnics at the reserved tables. A pair of elderly men enjoyed a casual game of chess, and he saw two girls about his age sunning themselves on a fleece blanket. Heero stopped at a vacant table by the creek and waited, toying with his Instagram account and adding a shot of the creek to his collection. It would be nice to do something with it later using a filter, or to even come back when he had his Nikon. He sipped his coffee and checked his watch. Two twenty-five. _Okay, Quatre, get your ass over here, already. Time’s a-wasting._

Fifteen minutes later, Heero was fuming, coffee down to the last dregs in its cup, no Quatre or pretentious boyfriend in sight. Great. Now, Heero had the long walk back to the cafeteria to look forward to, being late, and-

“HEERO! There he is!”

“I thought he was going to meet us on this side?” Heero recognized Wufei’s flat tone and looked up to see Quatre waving to him from the other side of the creek. 

“Come to this side!” Quatre called out. There was a tiny footbridge about fifty feet away. Heero fought the urge to argue “I got here first” and rose from the bench. 

“Be there in a minute,” he replied, and he tried to school his expression. Quatre didn’t appreciate his efforts.

“We kept looking for you,” he chided as Heero walked, then trotted to the bridge. 

_Just be nice. Just be nice. Just be nice._ He heard Quatre murmuring to Wufei that “at least he didn’t wear the hat.” That should have pleased him, at least a little. Wufei smirked, though, and that ruined it for him. Wufei wore a snug, charcoal gray tee shirt and black skinny jeans, with his dark hair skinned back into a short ponytail, expensive pair of Oakley sunglasses hanging from his neckline. His look was a severe contrast to Quatre, who had taken Heero’s advice. He wore a lilac purple dri-fit tank, khakis and a pair of loafers. The pastel shades suited his light coloring and would look great in the photo, to be honest. Heero also noticed that Quatre had nice arms, and he hadn’t skipped putting on any of his ubiquitous silver rings. That pleased him; it would make him interesting to draw.

If he could just peel him off of his boyfriend.

“Tuck your shirt in,” Wufei nagged him.

“I hate it tucked in,” Quatre argued.

“It looks sloppy.” It didn’t. It was a fitted tank, but Heero said nothing. Wufei smoothed a lock of Quatre’s hair back from his eyes, and Quatre looked exasperated, but he tolerated it. “I just want you to look your best.”

“Awwww. You _do_ care.” And then they kissed, and Heero looked away, because this wasn’t helping him get to work on time. Hearing Quatre’s low hum of approval annoyed him even more. _Get a room, you two. Sheesh._

“Okay,” Quat told him when he came up for air. “Snap away, Heero. Where do you want me?”

 _In somebody else’s section of Drawing 2A. Not mine._ “On the bridge. Lean against the rail?”

“With my back against it, or my front?”

“Back. That way I can see all of you.” Quatre beamed; it was the right thing to say. Heero smothered a sigh and waited for Quatre to walk up onto the bridge. He situated himself from him, testing each angle, before Heero himself got up on the bridge from the other side so the light wasn’t in his eyes for the shot. “That’s not bad. Relax. Slouch a teeny bit.”

“Don’t slouch,” Wufei insisted. “It won’t look good.”

Quatre instantly straightened.

“Don’t look stiff,” Heero chided, and the look Wufei gave him could only be described as a glare. Heero glared back. “Drop your shoulders. I’d like to see your neck.”

That made a small smile bloom on Quatre’s face, and Heero captured it quickly. “That was nice.” He tried a second one when Quatre’s smile widened another notch just from that praise. “Since I’m up here, too, let’s do a profile shot. Face out that way, this time.” And Heero liked the way that pose opened up the line of his spine this time, showing the rounded contours of his shoulders and the way the light hit them. The sunlight danced in his blond waves, and Heero enjoyed this shot, too, for how soft and natural it was. 

Quatre looked up at the sound of Heero’s phone’s faint click. “Can I see?”

“Uh-huh.” Quatre hurried over and was back in Heero’s personal space, close enough that he could smell mint on his breath. He leaned over his shoulder and tapped the image onscreen, then widened it with his finger and thumb. 

“Oh. That’s not bad at all. I think I like… hey, ‘Fei? C’mere a sec! Look at these so far!”

Heero sighed quietly, then handed his phone over to Quat. Wufei hadn’t moved; Quatre rushed over to him instead to show him the shots, which told Heero more than he would ever need to know about the nature of their relationship. Wufei took the phone and squinted at it.

“It’s okay. You should tuck the shirt in.”

“Heero, can we do one with the shirt tucked in?” Quat asked.

“If you want,” Heero offered, even though his hopes of getting to work on time were dashed to bits, now. “If you can get back onto the rail where you were. Back in the same light. That was what I liked best about the pose, anyway.” He didn’t give a shit about Quatre’s shirt.

Quatre smiled, satisfied, and he resumed his same spot on the bridge. Heero duplicated the shot as best as he could. “Want another, since we’re here?”

“Like what?”

“Just… I don’t know. Something fun. See that branch?” There was a narrow log protruding up through the stream, the wavelets barely disturbing it. “If you don’t mind taking off your shoes and rolling up your pants, you walking on it would make a cool shot.”

“Oh. I guess?”

“Bare feet?” Wufei’s mouth twisted in distaste.

“It’s warm out today,” pointed out. He fished in his backpack and found the handful of napkins he had purloined from the coffee cart. “You can dry your feet off with these if you want?”

“That’s fine,” Quatre told him.

“Babe. In the creek?” Wufei asked, incredulous.

“I trust his judgment. It will be a neat shot,” Quatre told him, shrugging. 

That wasn’t what Heero expected. But he would take it.

Quatre kicked off his loafers and socks, then rolled up his pants cuffs a few inches. He had long, elegant feet with toes that looked pedicured, not a callous in sight. Quatre waded out into the creek and hopped up onto the log, teetering for a moment before he caught his balance. Heero wished he had his Nikon, now, to catch some of the “in-between” frames of that action, but Heero took a couple of experimental shots. “Face that way,” he suggested. “Step into that little patch of light.” Dappled shadows scattered over his fair skin from the trees overhead, and the sun was loving Quatre’s hair again. Quatre spread his arms a little, to keep his balance, and Heero captured it, enjoying Quatre’s amused expression more than he would admit. Quatre turned to Wufei and crouched forward, blowing Wufei a kiss, and Heero huffed. Okay, that was sickening, but at the same time, it made a cute shot. He took that one, too.

“Your friend doesn’t have all day, babe,” Wufei insisted.

“Okay.” But Quatre was enjoying himself. “The water’s freezing, but it feels nice right now!”

“See? Bare feet,” Heero told him, shrugging. Not one of his worse ideas, then.

Quatre finally came ashore and went into his backpack, reaching for his Samsung phone with its enormous screen. “Okay. Do something interesting.”

“Oooo-kay. Like…?”

“Do a fighter pose,” Quatre told him. 

“What kind?” The idea sounded a little ridiculous, but Heero was on board if it would get him to work a little sooner and give Quatre a picture he actually wanted to work from.

“I don’t know. MMA? Ninja Turtles? Dragon Ball? Your pick.”

Heero actually cracked a smile. Wufei shook his head, then rolled his eyes.

“That won’t make a good drawing,” he told his boyfriend.

“Are you kidding? It will make a _great_ drawing.” Quatre was already nodding for Heero to move. “The glare’s in my eye, so move that way.” Heero sighed, but he obeyed. He struck a sample pose, right fist extended down, leaning his weight on his back foot, expression fierce (maybe just “grumpy,” but “fierce,” in his mind). 

It worked for Quatre. “That’s good! That!” Quatre shot it, then said, “Do another one. Do a ‘kamehamehah’ from Dragon Ball!” Heero laughed, because he knew just the pose, and he crouched down, twisting and pulling his hands back like he was gathering a ball of energy. “That looks good,” he insisted. Wufei chuckled without humor behind him.

Heero would have enjoyed their impromptu shoot more without him there. 

He straightened up and headed for his backpack and phone. “Is that good enough?”

“Don’t you want to see?” Quatre asked him. 

“I trust you. We don’t have time to shoot anymore of them.”

“I know. Sorry we were late. But, hey, let me get a close-up shot really quick, so I can get the details of your face.” Heero huffed, then gave him a tentative smile. “Give me the grumpy face again.” (Okay. So much for being fierce. Heero obliged.) Wufei snorted.

“We done here?”

“Yup.”

Quatre dried his feet off and donned his shoes again. “Hey, Heero,” he piped up, “need a ride to work? Did you walk here?”

“I did.”

“Oh, ‘Fei, let’s give him a lift, please. He’ll be late. We took up his time.”

“He was on the wrong side of the bridge,” Wufei muttered, but he nodded at Heero. “C’mon. We can take you.”

“Not if you’re busy,” Heero said, but Quatre wasn’t having it. He shook his head and took Heero by the wrist, his grip firm and insistent. Heero flushed at the contact, feeling like a child whose mother was rushing him across the street at the walk light. 

“We’ll take you. ‘Fei just had his car detailed.”

“Oh, goodie…”

*

Okay. So the only thing worse than watching Wufei and Quatre canoodling at the creek was being trapped in the car with it happening at closer range while they drove. Heero kept his eyes right, staring out of the passenger window as though the after school pedestrian traffic was the most interesting thing in the world. The car had a sea breeze scented air freshener and the leather upholstery was pristine and new. Wufei apparently came from money, too. _Must be nice._

“Heero, thanks for meeting us to do this,” Quatre told him. “I’d be a little hopeless without you.”

“I could have taken the photos for you, babe,” Wufei told him, annoyance in his tone. Heero shrugged.

“No problem. Thanks for the lift.”

“See you in class, Heero,” Quatre told him, giving him a bright smile. Wufei’s was less sincere, and he was pulling away from the curb the instant that Heero let the door shut. Well.

Howard gave him the stink eye as he clocked in. “You’re late, buddy.”

“I had to finish an assignment. Sorry.” 

“Go change. You’re on grill. I already gave Sally the spot in the serving line, since she was here earlier to set up.”

Oh, joy.

*

The next day, when they met in class, Dr. Johnson doled out the paper he wanted them to use, and he walked them through mounting the pieces on the wall so they could draw the sketches standing up. “Pay attention to proportion. Notice how many heads tall your drawing buddy is. That doesn’t mean take out a measuring tape. They’re standing next to you right now. Get to know them. Don’t be strangers.”

They started their rough sketches, and Heero decided to be merciful to Quatre, helping him to get started. 

“Here.” He took the photo that Quatre actually printed out from his phone onto copy paper and used a drawing pencil to draw hash marks around the borders. “That will make it easier to plot out. You can see that my elbow is about halfway down the page. My head is three-quarters down. My arms are foreshortened where they bend back.”

“Okay,” Quatre said. “I guess. Okay. I can do this.” His smile was sheepish. “Thanks, Heero.”

“Sure.”

“I can’t promise that I won’t end up drawing you looking like Tyrion Lannister by the time this is done, though.”

*

 

“How’s it going?” Relena inquired as she met him in the cafeteria serving line. He’d finally gotten a decent shift and he wasn’t covered in chicken strip grease.

“About how you’d expect. Drawing faces is a bit of a challenge for my partner.” 

Relena smirked. “Oh, God. I can only imagine.”

“Yeah.”

“How bad?”

“Cubist Picasso.”

“Ouch.” Her eyes danced with amusement. “I’ll take one of the enchiladas. Not too much sauce.”

“Here you go. Beans?”

“Any clue what’s in them?”

“I just saw them open a can.”

“No on the beans, then.”

Before he could offer her the yellow rice, he heard a familiar tenor call his name. “Hey, Heero! I was wondering when you worked!”

It was Quatre, waving to him from the very limited salad bar. He was cherry-picking the selections, wrinkling his nose at a tub of sliced mushrooms that were graying with age. He gave Heero a bright smile, though, and Heero waved uncertainly.

“Speak of the Devil,” Relena muttered. “He’s looking very teal, today.”

The dress shirt brought out his eyes and the sleeves were rolled above his elbows. Heero privately thought it was a good look for him, even though he liked seeing him less buttoned up, like he’d been at the creek. Quatre drew up a ladleful of the vinaigrette and sniffed it dubiously before he poured it into a little plastic side cup, capping it with the little clear lid. Heero sighed. Quatre _had_ told him he never ate there, hadn’t he?

Quatre surprised him again when he actually got into the hot entrée line. “He’s living dangerously today,” Heero murmured.

“I’ll let you go,” Relena told him. “Have fun…”

“Shut up,” he hissed, before he plastered on a noncommittal smile, waving on the girl who asked him for two enchiladas and rice once he served it up. Quatre set his tray on the steel counter and peered at the selections.

“Wow. That all looks… hideous.”

“That’s where your tuition dollars are headed, buddy. What can I get you?”

“How about a study session? I mean, a drawing session?”

“Oooo-kay.” 

Quatre rattled on, heedless of the students behind him. “I need more help,” he said. “I know you’re busy with work, but I can’t… I’m not making progress. I need this grade.”

“The studio has lab hours if you need to get in there and draw,” Heero pointed out. “Just talk to Dr. Johnson.”

Quatre gave him an aggrieved sigh.

“Are you gonna order?” the girl behind him asked. “Some of us are actually hungry?”

Quatre flushed. Heero almost pitied him.

“So. This is you without the food stains,” Quatre remarked when he turned back to really look at him.

“It’s early yet. I can’t interest you in an enchilada?”

“Not even if you served it to me wearing a leopard print thong and Chippendale collar. Oh, my God, no. Never, Heero.”

And so help him, _that_ dragged a laugh out of him.

“Hungry back here,” the girl behind him prodded again. Sally beckoned to her to come to her side of the line to be served, and Quatre stared at Heero hopefully, giving him puppy dog eyes.

“Pretty please? Text me when you get off? I’ll be at Wufei’s apartment-“

Because of _course_ he would.

“-but I will check my messages. Just message me?”

Heero sighed. He had a whole shitload of things to work on, including his article for the college’s art history journal. With Trowa. 

“I’ll drop you a line,” he promised. Quatre smirked, making little shooty fingers at him and clicking his tongue. It was a cheesy gesture. It didn’t endear him to Heero, but he retreated from the counter and freed up the serving line.

“You’re a lifesaver.”

“You suck,” Heero muttered under his breath once his back was turned.

*

 

Heero escaped the grease from the grill only to fall victim to a runaway pot of spaghetti sauce. He managed to dump half of it down his apron when it slipped from his hands as he was lifting it up from the heating well in the counter, its sides still slick and damp with condensation. “FUCK!” And it was still pretty hot, not scalding, but enough that he dropped the whole pot in shock when it splashed up and soaked him, splattering on his bare arms.

“Oh, God, Heero, are you all right?” Sally cried, hurrying to set down the tub of leftover spaghetti that she was covering with saran wrap and grabbing a towel. She dashed it under cold water, and Duo caught sight of the two of them, looking up from a conversation with a moony-eyed freshman.

“Oh, shit. Sorry, gotta go.” Duo rushed over, too, but with a mop. “You okay, bro?”

“Just… dandy,” Heero held out his arms in disgust, watching dollops of sauce drip off of him, trying not to shake it off and make the mess worse.

“Poor thing,” Sally crooned as she went around him and untied his apron. “Here. Let me help. That had to be hot.”

“I think I’m okay,” he said, but his arms told a different story. She pulled his apron off of him and gently daubed at his arms with the wet towel, and the skin was already reddened where the sauce hit it.

“Ouch,” Duo remarked with sympathy, already mopping up the mess. At least it was only marinara. “Better show that to Howard. He has to document it.”

“Go to the health center,” Sally told him. “They can give you something to put on that so it doesn’t blister.”

Howard didn’t wig out, thankfully, but he lectured Heero briefly about the serving line guidelines and to be more mindful in the future when he’s cleaning the serving counter. Heero kept his salty thoughts to himself, thanked him and clocked out. On his way out, he chucked his work shirt into the outside trash can. He didn’t feel like heading home in it with the enormous stains, and he had a spare tank in his backpack left from PE. It smelled a little ripe, but it was better than the alternative. He stopped at the student health center, saw that the lobby was packed full, and he decided to head to CVS on the way home instead to pick up some burn cream. He spent a little extra money on some aloe vera gel and a bottle of Weinhardt’s Root Beer and made his way to his apartment. It felt good on his bike, feeling the wind rush against his bare skin where it didn’t smart from the burn. He parked, checked his mail, and found Trowa at his door, leaning indolently against the frame. He smirked at him, then frowned when he saw his arms.

“What did you do to yourself?”

“Burned myself, like an idiot.”

“Let me see.” Trowa leaned up from the door and took Heero’s wrist, turning it do he could examine his arm. “That didn’t tickle.”

“Still doesn’t,” Heero admitted.

“I thought we could go study. I already called in a takeout order.”

“I already ate. And I have to text Quatre. He needs help with our project.”

Trowa pulled a face, shrugging. “I thought you two had to work on that _in_ class.”

“We can work on it whenever the studio is open,” Heero explained as he worked the key into the lock. His apartment smelled a little fresher than usual; he’d vacuumed the night before, gotten the dishes out of the sink and taken out the trash. Trowa let himself in and sat at his dinette table.

“We have an article to finish,” Trowa said.

“We will. But this grade matters, too.”

“Pfffftt… you can’t stand that guy. Just let him fail.”

“No. That won’t look good, if I’m working with him and I get a better grade than him.” Even though Trowa had a point, and it wasn’t like Quatre was his friend, anyway. He didn’t have a vested interest in helping him pass. But it just seemed rude to abandon him, too. Heero thought back to the photos that they took. They would make fun drawings if they were done well. But it was going to take an act of congress to get Quatre to have more confidence in his own skill, and to actually get him to complete his sketch as a finished, polished full-length portrait.

“Whatever,” Trowa said, shrugging. “So, how did you burn yourself?”

“A spectacular stunt with a pot of red sauce. You missed it.”

“Be more careful,” Trowa told him. “You could have been more badly hurt.”

“I wasn’t,” Heero said.

“Can we study?”

“Let me shower.”

Heero set down his things, and he was about to retreat to the bathroom when Trowa asked him, “Can I join you?”

Heero’s shoulders sank.

“Maybe… maybe it’s better if you don’t, this time. Trowa… it’s nice, but-“

“But, what?”

“You know what. You don’t feel that way about me anymore.”

Trowa huffed a laugh, leaning back in the chair and folding his arms. “I don’t? How do you think I feel?”

“I think you feel like this is convenient.”

And Heero didn’t know why he was letting the words drop like that, making Trowa a target, somehow. Blaming the feelings of disconnect on him. 

His mind flickered back to the image of Quatre and Wufei. They were…intolerable, granted. It was hard to watch them, smug in their mutual affection. Not for how saccharine it seemed, but…

…for how happy Quatre looked when he was with his boyfriend. Even though Wufei was kind of an ass. They were constantly touching, doing little things to take care of each other, even though Heero wasn’t crazy about the faint scold he heard in Wufei’s voice sometimes, when he spoke to Q. _That_ bothered him.

“We’re good as friends, Trowa,” Heero said. “We really are. It’s not that I don’t care about you, because I do. A lot.” Trowa closed the space between them, taking Heero’s shoulders.

“Heero. Just… c’mon. I enjoyed what we had. What we still have.” His fingers caressed Heero’s jaw, and Heero sighed, gently clasping the back of Trowa’s hand, leaning into his touch.

“It’s not the same. This isn’t bad, but it’s still not quite ‘right.’ I need more than this, and I don’t think that’s something you can give me. Don’t get me wrong, Trowa.” He saw a hint of hurt flash in Trowa’s eyes. “You’re hot as hell. If I could content myself with the whole ‘friends with benefits’ thing and just be fine with you showing up to knock a few holes in the wall with the headboard, that would be fine.”

“We’re good at that.”

“I’m not good with not having a relationship when I want one. I know that maybe I seem like I don’t want one, but…”

“But. You _want_ one.”

“Yeah.”

Trowa sighed deeply, leaning his forehead against Heero’s for a moment, listening to him breathe. His thumb stroked Heero’s cheek. “So that’s a no on the shower.”

“We can still study. If it’s just that.”

“You’re making this hard, Heero. I can’t… I don’t know how to do a ‘relationship.’”

“You admit that you’re in one. You wonder how you got there, but… you don’t regret it. You write my name surrounded by little hearts. Write me a sonnet. Bake me a cake and rub my feet.” Heero was joking, but his eyes sparked, because on some level, he wanted those things.

“Damn it, Heero.” And Trowa leaned down and claimed his mouth for a searching kiss, and Heero gave himself up to it, knowing this was the end of the road, but it didn’t have to end badly. It was like lapping up the last drops of ice cream melted in the bottom of the dish, knowing that too much wasn’t good for you but still savoring the sweetness on your tongue. They stood there for a few minutes, just drinking each other in, and Heero wished this could get them by. That it could be enough.

Pushing things that weren’t there would hurt them down the road. He didn’t want that. He wouldn’t settle for “strained” or “awkward” with Trowa Barton. Not when they could be honest and intimate as platonic friends who just really, really appreciated each other, and wasn’t that the point?

When they finally pulled apart, Trowa told him, “We’ll get together tomorrow at the library.” He nodded to Heero’s arm. “Get that looked at, please?”

“That’s fine.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Trowa ducked in for one last kiss, cupped his face. “I’m sorry,” he said. His tone was filled with defeat.

“So’m I.”

“Good night.”

“G’night, Trowa.”

Heero locked up and took a long, lukewarm shower, being mindful of his burns. He let the water run through his hair, closing his eyes, remembering the last shower with Trowa, his needy touch, the demanding kisses. The worst part as that he hadn’t felt loved. Hadn’t felt special.

It hurt so much.

 

He was numb when he got out and put on his pajama bottoms and a clean undershirt. He opened the window to let in the cool night air and fixed himself a bowl of dollar store ramen for dinner, flopped onto the loveseat, and watched an episode of Castle. He was halfway through it when he heard the low buzz of his phone.

It was Duo, checking up on him. _hows your arm, bro? u ok??_

“Still. Hurts,” Heero muttered as he typed back. “Stings. A. Little.”

_get some cream 4 it_

“I did.”

_at the library. Trowas here_

Heero sighed.

“Yeah. I know. We were going to study together.” He slurped up another mouthful of noodles before it hit him.

Shit.

He still had to message Quatre.

“I have to get a hold of somebody. Catch you tomorrow.”

 _fine then. B that way._ Duo sent him a pissed off emoticon, then one that stuck its tongue out at him, and he laughed.

“Ass,” he muttered. But it was just as well. It would have been weird talking to Duo while he was in close proximity to his ex. He set down his dinner bowl and thumbed through his contacts. _Annoying Asshole_. He edited it, then just typed in “QW.” That would suffice. He decided a photo to identify him wouldn’t hurt, either, and he used the one of Quatre leaning backward against the rail, cropping it to show him from the shoulders up. He looked relaxed and content. Heero hummed in approval.

He texted him, sighing. Time to figure out how to help him, without wanting to throttle him.

_Hey. When did you want to try to get together?_

The typing bubbles appeared immediately onscreen, and Heero was greeted with _OMG!!!!! Thank God! U got back 2 me!!!!!!_ There were text hearts… gads.

“Gads,” Heero muttered aloud. Seriously, Quat?

_Still at ‘Fei’s place. We’re having dinner. I made him steak and asparagus._

“Wasn’t that nice of you?” Heero asked his living room. _Sounds good._

 _It was._ That was accompanied by another smiley. _Hold on a sec._

Heero sighed, retrieving his noodles and finishing them off. Quatre was the one who told him to message him, so there was no point in him waiting in suspense. It took five minutes for him to get a response.

_Okay. There are lab hours tonight, aren’t there?_

_I’m already in PJs. Can we book some time tomorrow?_

_What time? I have three classes tomorrow, I’m booked with my trainer, and I have a tanning appointment._

That annoyed Heero, for some reason. _Why?_

_It was the only time I could book with her, silly. What do you mean, why???_

_Why tan at all?_

There was a pause, then more typing bubbles, then _’Fei thinks I look better with a tan._

 _Um. No._ Heero hated fake tans on anyone. People came out of tanning beds in three basic shades: Still Pasty, Sunburned, or Traffic Cone Orange. _There’s nothing sexy about melanoma. Just say no._

 _LOLOLOLOLOLOLZZZ!_ Heero chuckled. Quatre could be a dork. Funny.

More typing bubbles appeared. _Tans are TOO sexy!_

“Not my thing,” Heero said aloud as he typed it. “You have nice skin.”

 _Awwwwww!_ More smileys. Heero sighed. Okay. This was getting out of hand, now.

“When do you want to meet?”

_Do you have to work tomorrow?_

“I have to work almost every day. Including tomorrow.” But it was the lunch shift, and that meant that he wouldn’t have to stay as long at the end of the shift to clean up. Heero could probably squeeze in some time if he ate his dinner early. “How about six-ish?” he said as he typed.

_I’ll be free by then, but I’ll have to ask ‘Fei._

That rankled.

“Why do you have to _ask_ him? Just _tell_ him, Q,” Heero muttered.

But he texted back _Ok._

*

Trowa and Heero worked on their articles and managed a couple of decent drafts. Heero wasn’t bad at using Chicago Style, but he decided to take it to the tutoring center for some help with editing it. The tutor walked him through his edits, reminding him to cite his sources in a few places that he’d missed, and he was satisfied with it when he checked the wall clock and saw that it was time to go to work. On the way out, he saw Wufei in the library lobby. He noticed him talking to a small, slender girl with dark hair and an olive complexion, who was smiling at everything that he said. That gave him pause, and before Heero could look away, Wufei caught him staring, and his smile flatlined. Heero nodded to him and rushed off. What did he care who Wufei talked to?

Yet, why did he feel like he just saw something he shouldn’t have?

*

Heero finished up a grueling shift at work. The theater hosted a production of “Fiddler on the Roof,” and there was a rush of visitors in the cafeteria for dinner. The front serving counter kept running out of chicken strips and fries and burgers, and Heero was on tap to make trays of back-ups, and it took forever for Howard to finally let him brick the first grill top. Sally rushed by him with a huge tray of plated desserts and cookies for the front, and her face was flushed and sweating.

“This sucks,” she gasped.

“Right?” he muttered back. 

“Job security,” Duo said, shrugging as he hoisted a crate holding a five-gallon, spigoted bag of whole milk, staggering his way through the kitchen toward the serving area. The pot scrubbers were in the back listening to Iggy Azalea on the old boom box to ease the monotony of their task, and Heero regretted once again that someone stole the kitchen’s iHome speakers that allowed them to access Pandora from their phones. Top forty stations were Heero’s personal idea of Hell.

So of course he was a greasy, sweaty mess again when he finally got a text from Quatre. _We’re still meeting, right?_ Heero checked the clock, and shoot, it was already 6:45.

“That’s fine,” Heero murmured as his thumb moved over the screen. He was so tired. “Sorry I’m gonna smell like a McDonald’s drive-thru by the time I get there.”

Typing bubbles. _I don’t mind. Much._ Heero huffed.

“Asshat.” 

“What are you grinning about?” Duo demanded.

Had he been grinning?

“Nothing. Just have to go draw with Quatre.”

Duo gave him a confused look. “I thought you hated that guy.”

“He’s needy. And a little clueless. I’m taking pity on him.”

“Those words don’t belong in your mouth. I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.”

“What words?” Sally asked as she walked by the time clock and scanned her badge to sign out.

“Heero said he’s taking pity on this guy he can’t stand in his art class.”

“Which one?”

“Remember Blondie? The one turning up his nose at the salad the other day?”

“The one that looked like an Abercrombie ad?”

“Yep.”

“Saints preserve us,” she whispered dramatically, clasping her heart, and she laughed when Heero gave her a dead-eyed look.

“Stop.”

“We have to give you a hard time,” Sally explained. “It’s our goal in life.”

“Have fun with your ‘drawing lesson,’ Hee-chan,” Duo told him, smirking. He saluted him, and he was already on his skateboard as he descended the loading dock ramp out back. Heero went out to his bike, donned his helmet and careened out of his parallel space, glad at least to spend some time doing something he enjoyed, drawing, even if it involved spending time with someone he didn’t particularly care for.

He found Quatre in the studio, and it pleased him that he didn’t make him wait this time. He was wearing casual clothes, which pleased him. They were almost sloppy for Quatre, namely a pair of white relaxed fit jeans and a really, really old Red Hot Chili Peppers concert tee.

“Wow. That’s vintage,” Heero remarked.

“My sister Iria gave it to me. She saw them in concert _ages_ ago.” His smile lacked its usual wattage. “You weren’t kidding about the aroma.”

“I didn’t go home and change. Sorry. Wait a minute.” Heero dug into his backpack and retrieved the shirt he’d worn to class before his shift. “This might help.” He shucked his work tee and cap, hating to reveal his hat hair again. “I’d burn it, but they only let us have so many work shirts, so I have to do laundry pretty frequently.”

He noticed that Quatre was staring at him. “What?” He paused, arms thrust through the sleeves so far.

“Um. Nothing. Just… nothing.” Quatre licked his lips, a furtive gesture, and his eyes flitted over Heero’s bare torso. He turned away, and Heero flushed when he realized that he’d basically just given Quatre Winner a show, and he quickly jerked on his shirt. It was rumpled, but he was decent.

"If you don't mind me asking, Heero, what happened to your arms?"

“Huh?”

“Those marks. On your arms.”

“Oh. Work.” He rolled up his sleeve, and holding his arm out for him to inspect, and Quatre winced.

“Oh, Heero, what did you do to yourself?”

“Dropped some boiling hot sauce on myself.”

Quatre reached out and took his wrist, sympathy written on his face. “Looks like it hurt.” His touch was gentle, and Heero shivered when he ran a fingertip over a small patch of reddened skin. He jerked back, and Quatre released him. He looked embarrassed.

"So. You needed help, right?" Heero asked, needing to re-direct.

“I just need more help getting it going. I don’t know,” Quatre sighed, and he seemed a little…defeated.

“You okay?”

He threw up his hands, and his expression was searching, and he expelled a shaky sigh. “I had a bad argument with Wufei.”

_Shit. Here we go._

“What was bad about it?” Heero asked, even though he didn’t want to know, but if he was cavalier about it, told him “hey, suck it up, Buttercup, time’s a-wastin’ and we’re burning midnight oil! Let’s DRAW!” that might not go over so well. He unpacked his folio in the meantime, taking out charcoals and pastels and one of his newsprint pads.

“He was just really short with me. I don’t even feel like I did anything wrong. We usually get along so well. I don’t know what happened.”

 _You always give him his way._ Heero bit back the urge to tell him that. He merely nodded instead.

“I had finished washing the dinner dishes, and things seemed like they were going fine, but I told him I had to leave to work on my art project. He knows it’s an important grade, and he asked me why I don’t just drop that class, since it isn’t for my major, anyway.”

“It’s too late in the semester,” Heero reasoned.

“I know, right? I told him that. He just told me I was being ridiculous for taking a drawing class in the first place.”

“What’s…what’s your major, again?” Because Heero had never asked him before, and he felt a little guilty about it.

“Double. Business and Marketing.”

“Oh. Wow.” That surprised him.

“That’s why I work for my dad during the summers. He’s a CEO. He started at the bottom. Half of my sisters work for him, too. But if I’m being honest, Dad thinks I’m wasting his tuition money taking an art class, too. I just wanted to branch out. Do something more interesting for an elective. Drawing just seemed like it would be nice.”

“It is. When you learn the techniques,” Heero told him, fishing for something encouraging to say.

Quatre’s chuckle was bitter. “Sure. I’m hopeless. I’m probably wasting your time, right?”

 _Kind of._ “No.”

“Am I? Do you want to call it a night?” Quatre prepared to leave, but Heero held up a hand to stop him.

“Uh-uh. No way. Look, we’re working on this together. I just think it wouldn’t be right if we both didn’t pass this project. Don’t screw up your whole semester GPA for the sake of an elective. You’re a business major. Your future isn’t going to rest on how well you draw a line.” 

Quatre mustered a faint smile.

“Look, take out your pad. We’re going to do a little warm-up.”

“Can I use pencil?”

“No. Vine charcoal. Get used to it. Practicing with it is the only way that will happen.”

Quatre groaned. “It’s so messy. I hate it.”

“It’s nice for smudging in nice, soft shadows and making something look three-dimensional,” Heero told him. “Give it a chance.”

Quatre pouted like a cranky child, rolling his eyes; Heero almost liked him for a moment. “Oh, fiiiiiiiiinne, then.”

Heero pulled an easel close to a full-length mirror over on the other side of the room. “We’ll use this. You’re going to be your model. You’re going to draw yourself.”

“Oh, God, no. I’ll suck at it.”

“Um, no. You know what you look like, better than anyone else.” He made Quatre sit in front of the mirror, and he looked less than thrilled. “Get your face at a nice angle. Okay, you’re going to block in the shape of your face. Just capture the contour of your cheek and jaw.” Quatre rested the tip of the charcoal against the paper and made a scratchy line. “You’re already overthinking it.”

“O-kayyyyy. _How_ am I doing that, exactly?”

“Remember that blind contour technique? Nicolaides blind contour? That really boring exercise where everyone had to draw their hand without looking at it? Everyone’s initial sketches looked like massive blobs of spaghetti that barely resembled fingers at all?”

“God, yes. I hated that assignment.”

“You’re supposed to. Because it’s lame.”

That earned Heero a chuckle.

“But it also teaches your hand to follow what your eyes are already looking at. When you look back and forth from your subject to your paper, you have to remember what you just looked at, and you lose information. When you keep looking at your subject more steadily, without as many pauses to look at your paper, you keep more of your subject’s information. You don’t give yourself as much of a chance to forget what you just saw. And your hand follows what you see.” Heero focused on Quatre’s reflection in the mirror, and he started with the high, sculpted line of his cheekbone. “We’ll start with those cheeks of yours. Those nice, fair-skinned cheeks that you should _not_ be thinking about tanning. Stay out of those tanning beds, Mr. Winner.” Quatre suppressed a laugh, trying not to change his expression much as Heero began to sketch. He let his vine drift down, cheekbone leading into Quatre’s square jawline, pristine and smooth. He had clear skin with small pores, and a few tiny freckles that Heero hadn’t noticed before.

He kept talking. “Okay. So we get the basic shape of your face. Now we continue with your eyes. Notice how far down they are from the forehead. The upper part of your face is five eyes’ wide. That doesn’t mean draw five eyes, but just count them to yourself when you are measuring how wide your face spans. Your eyes are very large. They’re set a teeny bit far apart. They have an interesting slant…”

“My mother was Slavic,” Quatre explained.

Was. That made Heero pause.

“She died before I ever knew her.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“I’ve never mentioned that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

The only sounds in the studio were the ticking clock on the wall and the soft scritches of Heero’s vine against the newsprint. “So, they were blue?”

“Blue?”

“Your mother’s eyes. Blue like yours?”

“They were in her pictures.”

Heero cleared his throat. “She must have been beautiful.”

Quatre glanced up at that, briefly, then remembered that Heero was trying to draw him and looked back in the direction he was supposed to be turned. “I just wish I could remember her.”

Heero roughed in Quatre’s nose. “Yeah.”

He drew a convincing yet simple sketch of Quatre and backed away to let Quatre look at it. Quatre tsked, shaking his head.

“Wow. You can do all that, barely looking at the paper. That’s me, again. How do you do that so easily?”

“It’s just what I do, but it took time to get it down.”

“No. You just have mad skills. I’m not worthy.” He mock-bowed, and this time, Heero laughed.

“Rise up, my son. Go forth, and sketch.” He handed Quatre the vine.

“Ugh.”

*

Ugh…

Quatre put forth a good effort, attempting to draw himself. He managed his eyes, for the most part, and the nose vaguely resembled its source, but he made it a little narrow at the end. It was a decent attempt. Hair seemed to escape him, and Heero knew it was going to be a challenge for him to draw _his_ with all of its spikes and waves. But the practice helped.

“Feel a little more confident, Q?”

Quatre gave him a funny look. “No one ever calls me that.”

“Sorry. I won’t if you hate it.”

“No. It’s fine. Everyone gets my name wrong. Spelling, how it’s pronounced, or they just plain fuck it all and call me something else altogether. I get ‘Patrick’ a lot.”

“Ooh. No. Not cool.”

“It’s not even a bad name. It’s just not _mine_.”

“Yours is different,” Heero remarked. 

“So. Yuy. Where is that from?”

“My father’s Japanese.”

“Do people screw it up?”

“All the time. I get called ‘Huey’ a lot.”

“Like Donald Duck’s nephews.”

“Pretty much.”

“That would _suck_.”

“Sure. Remind me again. Because it gets so much better sounding with repetition.” Heero put away his charcoals, then feigned injury when Quatre gave him a little kick in the shin.

“All right. No more excuses. Now you can work on your big sketch. Keep coming back between classes. You don’t want to fall behind.”

“Can you meet me again, sometime?”

“You don’t really need me to-“

“I kinda do. I mean… it was helpful, to work on it with you right here.”

Oh.

“It was good to be able to look at your face when I needed to, and, um, I know I have your photo, but it’s helpful to have the real deal, right here.” Quatre swallowed. “That probably sounded lame.”

“Yeah. But, yeah. I get it. Sometimes a picture doesn’t give you everything.”

Quatre gave him a shy little smile. “I’ll get going. ‘Fei will be wondering what’s taking me so long.” He looked at his watch. They had been there, drawing and chatting, even joking around a little, for two hours. It went by fast. Quatre was already sending his boyfriend a text. Heero decided that was his cue to go.

“It’s funny. Every time I mention that I’m going to meet you for anything, ‘Fei gets all weird.” Quat sat there, just smiling and typing away on his screen, missing the expression on Heero’s face. “His nose gets all out of joint whenever I so much as mention your name.”

“Guess I’m just not his cup of tea,” Heero told him, voice flat. Quatre looked up from his phone, his blue eyes troubled.

“Oh. No. I didn’t mean… he doesn’t dislike you, or anything, Heero. I mean, he hardly even _knows_ you.”

“It doesn’t matter much if he likes me or not,” Heero snapped. “I’m just some guy in your class, right?” He felt heat rise up in his cheeks, and the words stumbled out on autopilot, ugly and brittle. “It’s not like you and I ever hang out, so there’s no reason for his nose to be out of joint. Good luck with your sketch. Sorry if you meant to pick someone else.”

Heero swept out of the studio, and he heard Quatre shuffling around behind him, scooting off his metal stool. “That’s not how I meant for it to sound, Heero! HEERO!”

“Quatre, I’ll see you in class.”

Heero had enough for one night. Trowa was right; Quatre didn’t even need his drawing class, so why was Heero wasting his time on helping him?

He argued that point with himself all the way home. His night was uneasy when he crawled into bed.

*

It shouldn’t have bothered him. He couldn’t stand Quatre Winner, anyway.

The thought beat a tattoo in his brain all the way to work, all the way through his actual shift, and when he finally reached drawing class, there was a very quiet Quatre unpacking his art supplies, doing his best to ignore him. The air between them was glacial, the silence almost hostile. Heero shrugged to himself and got out his reference photos and charcoals.

Relena noticed the difference between them, saw that Quatre lacked his usual ebullience. She and Dorothy stole looks at both young men and whispered to each other, but Heero ignored them, too. The class period felt too long. Quatre moved awkwardly past him, cutting Heero a wide berth every time he moved back from his drawing to get a better look at it. Heero just drew, adjusted his sketch for proportion where it seemed like it needed it, and he realized he was having a hard time. He’d redrawn the same arm three times, and the angle wouldn’t work for him. Why was the anatomy escaping him?

The studio felt too loud, too crowded, the low buzz of conversation and scratching of coal and pastel moving across the paper too much. The ticking clock seemed to pound in his head, and he felt the low-simmering frustration in Quatre, too.

Quatre’s sketch reflected his hurt feelings. Heero’s eye was decidedly crooked, and his limbs looked too straight; Quatre was less concerned with his anatomy and more with just getting it done. Heero wouldn’t put it past Quatre to _intentionally,_ literally make him look like an ass.

The next two class sessions yielded more tension between them. They nodded at each other when eye contact was made. Heero noticed small differences in Quatre; he huddled separate from the class when Dr. Johnson lectured and ran slides, furtively checking his phone. Heero longed to take it from him and chuck it out the window.

By the next session, Heero decided it was time to work on Quatre’s portrait with more attention to the face, which was going to be tricky. It was sometimes hard to capture someone from a photo, all of the small nuances that gave them character. The quirk of the lips, the constant shift of mood reflected in their eyes, the minute flare of the nostrils and raising of the brows, the faint lines around the mouth.

Doctor Johnson beckoned to the class for their attention. “All right. We’re going to be wrapping up your portraits pretty soon. Two more weeks, and then we mount the art show entries in the library. I’ll need volunteers to help me hang these portraits in the main reference room when the time comes. If you’re interested, please leave me your email or cell number, and I’ll contact you. Keep working with your partners. Good communication will make a difference in the finished product.”

Heero thought he saw Quatre smother a sigh, and he went back to his own drawing. He wanted to bring Quatre over a little closer to get a better angle on his mouth. The upper lip, right where it tucked into the corner, was giving him a hard time. But it was inviting trouble to ask him-

“”Hey. My nose doesn’t look like that. Does it?” Quatre gave Heero’s sketch a jaundiced look. “It looks really off.”

“Okay.” Heero studied it again. “How?”

“It’s just too turned up,” Quatre told him.

“Your nose _is_ kind of turned up,” Heero pointed out.”

“Not that much. It looks weird.”

“I was happy with it, but whatever. I can fix it a little.”

“Fix it a _lot_.” Quatre’s stance was stiff, and he was still avoiding looking at Heero, but he kept stealing glances at the drawing of himself.

Heero brooded and continued to sketch.

Until Quatre interrupted him again. “My cheeks aren’t that round.”

“I didn’t make them that round.”

“I look like the Pillsbury Dough Boy.”

“That’s not my fault.” Heero faced him this time, and Quatre looked mulish.

“Nice. That’s really nice, Heero.”

“Do _you_ want to draw yourself, then?” Heero felt annoyance rising in his chest. “Or do you just want to ask for a partial grade? I need this class for my major. You don’t. I’m working with what I have, which is a photo that hasn’t changed since I took it, and you seemed to be fine with my sketch until lately. It’s too late to switch partners, but I don’t want to _offend_ you for not doing you and your pretty face justice, Q!”

“Right. Fine.” Quatre’s eyes were flat, sandy blond brows drawn together, and to Heero’s surprise, he flipped him off. “Be the sensitive artist. I hate that drawing. I’m not crazy about you right now, either, Heero.”

And with that, he packed up his supplies and stalked out of the studio. “Drama queen,” Heero snapped at him under his breath as he brushed past him.

“Fuck you,” Quatre spat, and he whipped his phone out of his pack on his way out.

“Okay. That sounded a little tense. Is there anything I can do to help?” Dr. Johnson asked. He blinked owlishly at Heero through his reading glasses. Heero sighed, throwing up his hands.

“Sorry about that.”

“You two seemed like you were getting along pretty well.”

“We don’t have a lot in common. He doesn’t like my style much, and it’s hard to swallow criticism, sometimes.”

Dr. Johnson examined the sketch, then Heero’s reference photo. “That’s a nice shot of him. I like the lighting values you captured. You captured his pose pretty well, but his face is going to be tricky.” Heero nodded. “He has such rich expressions. It would be nice if your portrait of him reflected that.”

Well.

Heero’s day wasn’t panning out.

*

His art history class was relatively mellow, and at least he got to talk to Duo, which was a nice distraction.

“How’s the drawing going?”

“I wish it was finished. Seriously.”

“You look frustrated, Hee-chan.”

“I made him hate me. He got huffy with me over my sketch of him. We had a falling out.”

“You’re a great artist. What’s the problem?”

“It’s just not pulling together. It was easier when I could talk to him and not feel like he was staring daggers at me. I need to be able to look at him without things being weird between us.” They walked out into the quad following their class, and speak of the Devil, there was Quatre walking with Wufei, talking animatedly. 

“I’ll catch you later,” Duo told him. “Get ready for another day of fun and shenanigans.” Because they both had to work that afternoon. Heero was on pot duty, which was grueling, but at least it meant he could work alone. He saw them stop at a coffee cart just as Duo mounted his skateboard and dashed off. Quatre and Wufei were both impeccably dressed, no surprise. Heero had to walk past them to make his way across campus, and he tried to be inconspicuous. 

Their voices carried to him on the breeze from a few yards away, anyway. 

“You said you were going to call me and meet me for dinner.”

“I had to work late.”

“It would have been nice if you had told me. I kept my schedule clear for you.”

“I can’t predict when my boss is going to keep me longer, Quatre. Don’t act like a brat.”

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.”

"I was looking forward to seeing you last night. We haven't been able to spend much time together lately, 'Fei, and I-“

“We can’t always be joined at the hip. Can you be a good sport for me, babe?” He changed the subject, and Heero felt a flash of irritation. “What do you want in your coffee?”

Heero walked faster, angry at himself for eavesdropping. Part of him felt anger on Quatre’s behalf, but he shook it off. It was none of his business.

*

Heero turned in his art history articles for the journal. His professor posted their grades on the portal two days later, and to his relief, he got an A. Trowa did, too, which pleased him. Their exchanges lately were brief, but Trowa was still cordial to him. Heero’s apartment felt emptier without him in it, but he needed the space to just be who he was, without wondering what he was to someone else, and with Trowa, he _always_ wondered.

Heero decided it was time to clean his apartment and tackle his laundry pile, since he was out of clean socks and his living room had that “lived in” aroma. He hauled out his Dirt Devil and vacuumed, sponge-mopped his kitchen floor, and gave the bathroom a once-over with bleach and Comet. He gathered up his hamper and the bottle of Arm and Hammer liquid that had one, or maybe two loads left in it before he had to go to Costco again.

The laundromat was crowded, but Heero managed to get the last large capacity machine, and his entire dark load went into it. He put his whites into a smaller machine and fiddled with his phone, indulging in some Instagram and Twitter. 

He was surprised when he received a text message. QW.

“Hello,” he murmured. He opened it and noticed right away the lack of emoticons.

 _Can I meet with you?_ No abbreviations. Decent punctuation. This wasn’t Quatre’s usual rapid-fire babble.

Heero hesitated. He had planned to go to the studio and work on the drawing while he still felt motivated. Meeting with Quatre might throw a monkey wrench into those plans.  
Before he could form a response, the typing bubbles appeared on his screen.

_I really need someone to talk to. If you don’t mind._

_I don’t mind._

_Can I buy you a coffee?_

_That’s fine. Starbucks?_

_I’m in the mood for some place less crowded. How about Naked Café?_

That surprised Heero. The café was a hole in the wall, owned by an older hippie couple and boasting organic teas and coffee bean blends that Heero couldn’t even pronounce, vegan pastries, and beat-up leather couches inside. It didn’t seem like the kind of place that Quatre would choose, but it was one of Heero’s favorites.

_I’ll be finished with my laundry in about a half an hour?_

_That’s fine. Hey, Heero?_

_What’s up, Q?_

_I’m sorry I was an ass._

The knot of tension in Heero’s gut unwound itself, and he expelled a sigh of relief.

_Yeah? Well, I’m sorry, too._

Heero switched out his loads and let them tumble away. The wind was shifting outside, making the branches overhead sway, throwing wild patches of shadow over the sunny pavement. It was a nice day to ride to the café and meet a friend.

 

He arrived at the café and scanned the front room, noticing that he didn’t appear to be there yet, but then he heard his name from the entrance to the back room, and Quatre was giving him a weak little wave. He was wearing a dark pair of Oakleys, reminding Heero of the pair that Wufei had on the first time they met, and Q was in casual togs again, this time a pair of ratty, ripped jeans and a black character tee that made Heero chuckle when he saw it. _Pikachubacca._

“That’s different.”

“It’s comfortable.” Quatre rubbed his nape. “And ‘Fei hates it.”

Because of course he did. Heero sighed.

“I like it.”

“I got it at a comic convention last summer.”

That surprised Heero. “I didn’t know you were into cons.”

“They’re fun.” Quatre gave a brittle laugh. “Dad thinks those are a waste of time, too, and ‘Fei didn’t want to go with me when I got him a ticket. It was too late to get a refund, so I ate the cost.”

“Sounds like it would’ve been fun.”

“It was.”

Heero hoped that their whole conversation didn’t center around Wufei, but Quatre seemed stiff and frustrated. “You okay?”

“No.”

“Let’s order.”

“I snagged us a table in back.”

“Okay.”

They ordered their drinks at the counter. Heero ordered cheaply at first, since Q said he was treating, but Quatre stopped him. “Get something good, okay?” Heero switched his iced coffee to a blended white mocha. Quatre ordered a caramel frap, which hosted an impressive crown of whip once it was ready. 

“That looks more like dessert than coffee,” Heero mentioned.

“Don’t judge me,” Quatre grumbled as he sucked down a generous gulp of it, and his face telegraphed rapture. “God, that’s heaven in a cup.”

“Looks like you needed it.”

“Yeah.” Q took off his sunglasses, and Heero frowned at the dark circles beneath them and how bloodshot and puffy they were.

“What happened?”

“We had another fight. Just out of the blue. He said some things that weren’t kind.”

Heero sipped his drink, silently fuming.

“Things have been kind of different, lately. I try to please him, y’know?”

Heero nodded.

“Sometimes, it seems like that’s all I do. We were doing really well for a while. We spent a lot of time together. I’d make him his favorite things to eat, and we’d go to the gym together, and he took me out dancing all the time. He was always so supportive. But, it’s like, I can’t do anything to please him these days.”

“How do you mean?”

“He’s all over me lately about how I look.” Quatre miserably plunged his straw in and out of his drink. “He told me it didn’t seem like I was making much of an effort when we went out the other night. He said maybe he shouldn’t even take me out if I cared that little. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be seen with me.”

“You’re always really put together.”

“Not well enough.”

Bullshit, Heero wanted to say.

“He’s been nitpicking everything I do. I feel like I can’t do anything right.”

Heero softly shook his head and told him, “That’s not true.”

“It feels that way, though. So… I guess, I wanted to talk to you. I know you don’t want to hear about me and ‘Fei, but… I just wanted to tell you why I went off on you in class. I heard ‘Fei’s voice in my head, telling me I didn’t care how I looked for him, and that I didn’t care about how he felt about anything else, and that I was taking up his time and didn’t have any business demanding to know when he’d be home-“

Quatre’s eyes were leaking tears.

“- so, y’know, I looked at your sketch. I saw myself in it, and I wondered how _you_ saw me, and I… I felt unsure of myself.”

And Heero had mocked him with his “pretty face” comment and right now, he felt like a complete shitheel.

“Shit,” he muttered. “Q. I fucked up. I didn’t mean to-“

“No. I attacked you. I didn’t have any business being so critical.”

“No. You did. The drawing wasn’t working out right. I mean, that is _you_ up there. It should _look_ like you, and I should have taken your input and not been such a baby about it.”

Quatre gave him a watery smile, and he dug the heel of his hand into his eye. “No. It’s okay. You’re really talented, and I’m jealous. I just had a lot on my mind. I care about ‘Fei. I just feel like I’m not good enough.” More tears were rolling down his cheeks, and Heero swallowed roughly. Empathy clawed at him, and Quatre’s doubts about himself and his anguish didn’t sit right with Heero.

“You are.”

“Sure.” He didn’t sound convinced, and that upset Heero. He toyed with his empty straw wrapper, slowly balling it up in his fingers.

“So. I guess I should tell you, Quatre, that I wasn’t mad when you said the drawing didn’t look like you. I was mad because I’m kinda stuck with it. I’m having a hard time getting it right. I’d like it if I could go with you into the studio like we did before to work on it. We have less than two weeks left. Would that help you, too? We can just knock it out?”

Quatre nodded eagerly. “Can we? I’ve been an ass. You’ve been making time for me, and I haven’t been reciprocating, Heero, and I’m so sorry. I know you probably think I’m selfish.”

“Hey, I didn’t want to cut into your tanning time,” Heero teased, “even if you don’t need it.”

“I like to be tan!”

“You don’t even need it.”

“No. _You_ don’t need it. Your complexion’s perfect,” Quatre insisted. 

Heero felt self-conscious about the compliment. He ducked his face and laughed softly.

“It is!” Quatre insisted. “You know that you’re _really_ cute, right? I’m just worried that I’m going to screw up my drawing of you. I can’t do you justice.”

Heero’s cheeks heated up at the praise.

“I think you’ll do fine.”

They lingered over their drinks, chatting about the artwork hanging on the walls, some with outrageous price tags. “You should be showing and selling your stuff here,” Quatre told him.

“It’s hard to find the time to paint enough pieces to have a full show.”

“Maybe you could if you weren’t always working,” Quatre told him.

“My bills won’t pay themselves.”

“Do you get financial aid?”

“Some.”

“Don’t your parents help you?”

“They really don’t.” Heero chased after the dregs of whipped cream in his cup with his straw.

“Is that a difficult topic?”

"If being disowned when you finally come out to them counts as ‘difficult,’ then kind of, yeah.”

Quatre made a sympathetic noise.

“So, working less isn’t really an option.”

“I guess it isn’t. Right. So, we’ll just forget I mentioned it and-“

“No. It’s okay. It is what it is.”

“Were you close before?”

“No. This was never a matter of ‘if,’ Q. It was always a matter of ‘when.’”

“I know, but… it bugs me.”

“It doesn’t have to.”

“No. It does. It shouldn’t feel like a gambit when you’re being honest with your parents. The whole point of them being ‘parents’ is that you can tell them anything,” Quatre said. He considered something. “So where do you go for holidays?”

“My couch.”

“That. Yeah. That _sucks_.”

“Kinda does. Kinda used to it, now.”

“Um, no. Nobody should be alone on Christmas. No Bueno.”

Heero chuckled.

“Seriously. I _love_ Christmas. Shopping for my sisters is a challenge and a half, but it’s just nice when we can get together.”

“Are your sisters picky?”

“No. I just have a lot of them.”

Heero was intrigued. “How many?”

“I’m the youngest of twenty-eight kids.”

Heero had been sucking up the last of his coffee, and that number made him choke on it.

“Holy- *kaff-kaff-eeargggh* - shit. You did not just say ‘Twenty-eight.’”

“Kinda did.” Quatre’s smile was wicked. “Mom and Dad are great at running a business. They weren’t so good at planned parenthood.”

"Okay, then."

Quatre snickered. Heero was glad that he looked more relaxed, less rattled. 

“So, let’s meet up. We’ll get the drawings finished so you don’t have to fret about it anymore,” Heero told him. 

“Hope you have an easier time than I am,” Quatre groused.

“I’m trying,” Heero confessed. “But I can’t seem to get your mouth right.”

Quatre’s brows rose in surprise.

“Oh.”

*

They met the next night after Heero finished his shift. He showed up in the studio, hair still damp from his shower. Quatre was, frankly, looking fresh and effortlessly cute in a black, mock turtleneck dri-fit tank that showed off his broad shoulders and sleek arms, dark jeans, and short black boots. He looked like he’d taken care with his hair.

“Got a date after this?” Heero inquired.

“No. Why?”

“You just look… well put-together. Like you’re planning on going somewhere.”

“No. Not really. Just here.” Quatre already had his supplies out. “Hey,” he said suddenly, “want some music? It’s always so quiet in here. It’s almost too much. I hate listening to the clock.”

Heero smiled and nodded. “I was hoping you’d say that. I work better with music, anyway.”

Quatre brightened. “You do? Do you usually play anything when you paint?”

“All the time.”

“What kind of music do you like?”

“A little of everything. Not top forty, though. Sometimes I like blues. Clapton’s one of my favorites. I also listen to a lot of nineties grunge.”

“Nirvana?” Quatre mentioned.

“A little. But I mean pretty much anything from the Singles soundtrack. Primus. They were great. Alice in Chains.”

“Ooh. I loved them. I was heartbroken about the lead singer dying.”

They chatted about music as Heero set up his phone, and he plugged it into the new iHome speaker that Dr. Johnson dared to purchase, but that he kept put away in the cabinet in his desk. Nine Inch Nails filled the studio at low volume, and Heero took a look at his portrait of Quatre.

“So, yeah. Your mouth. It’s giving me a hard time.”

“Why?” Quatre looked amused.

“It’s just, I don’t know how to describe the problem I’m having with it. I can’t get the angle, or the right curve of your upper lip.”

“Is it that weird?”

“No! You don’t have a weird lip!”

Quatre mimed wiping away sweat. “Phew!”

“Goofball.”

“So my lip’s giving you trouble.”

“Yeah. Just, stay right there.” Heero went into the closet and took out a folding lamp. He hooked it onto the edge of a nearby easel and clicked it on. Quatre squinted and covered his eyes at the glare. “Okay. Sit.” He pulled up a stool for him. “Turn your head for me. Just a little to the left.”

“Here?”

“Yeah. Like… that.” Heero’s voice dropped to a murmur as he took out his charcoal. He adjusted the lamp, moving the easel farther away, then angling the light to get a good look at Q’s face.

_Beautiful._

“Just like that,” Heero murmured. “Okay. Hold that pose.”

Quatre was quiet and still as Heero began to erase and rework his lines, blocking in his mouth, rethinking the angle and curves. Quatre had a deep, sharp notch in his upper lip, and his mouth was wide, something Heero noticed whenever he smiled. His lips were a deep, natural rose, gleaming slightly; Heero wondered if he snuck on some Carmex or Chap-Stick on the way over. Quatre smelled good, tonight. He didn’t overdo it on the cologne. It was metallic smelling and masculine, and it worked well with his chemistry. It made him hyper-aware of how close he was as he continued to draw.

“Hn,” Heero huffed. “Okay. That’s what I keep getting wrong. Just this tiny… scar. You have a scar.”

“God. I know.” Quatre sounded a little disgusted.

“It doesn’t look bad. I hope you don’t mind that I noticed. It’s what’s been throwing me off.” The scar was faint, almost imperceptible, but it threw off the symmetry of his mouth. Just a hint. “There. Where your top lip meets the corner of your mouth. I kept wondering why I kept getting it wrong.”

“Well, now you know.”

Quatre’s voice sounded odd. Heero paused in his sketching. Quatre’s face was tilted down, not looking at Heero. He set down his charcoal and reached out, turning off the lamp.

Quatre was tearing up.

“I’m sorry.”

“No. It’s okay.”

“I didn’t know it was something that bothered you.” Heero pulled up a stool and sat in front of him. Quatre expelled a low sigh, and he wiped his eyes with his finger and thumb.

“I was still little. My mom had already been gone for a couple of years.” He hugged himself. “My father was in his study. He was having a bad day.”

Heero steeled himself.

“He was drinking a glass of scotch. From this short glass tumbler. He didn’t hear me come inside. He was upset. He had her pictures out, and, and it made him sad, y’know?”

“What happened, Q?”

“He threw the glass against the doorframe. It shattered. There was scotch everywhere. He didn’t see me, and a shard of glass flew at my face. I got a really deep cut.” Quatre shook his head at the memory. “I started screaming, and he looked horrified at what he’d done. There was a lot of blood, even though the cut itself wasn’t that big.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault.”

“I’m sorry it happened.”

“And y’know what? When you get hurt, all you want is your mom. I didn’t have her, and I was hurt, and I didn’t have her to kiss it and make it better-“

His voice was shaking, and the tears sparked again, escaping and slipping down his cheeks, and Heero’s chest felt too tight. He searched for something to say and came up empty, and his body wasn’t satisfied with his inability to comfort Quatre, with his failure to find the right words. His legs propelled him up from the stool, and Quatre made a sound of surprise when Heero pulled him into his arms.

His heart pounded in his ears as the voices in his head cried out to him, _Are you NUTS?_ He’d misstepped. This was Quatre. This wasn’t appropriate, and they didn’t have that kind of friendship, because they _weren’t_ even people who hung out together, and-

\- and Quatre’s arms snared him, and he burrowed more deeply into his embrace. His hands were clutching at Heero’s back, tangling in his shirt, and his breathing was still shaky, voice uneven as he said “Thank you.”

“It’s okay. It’ll be okay,” Heero murmured, and his fingers found Quatre’s hair, soft and smelling like some herbal shampoo. He felt Quatre nod against him, and he was sniffling, his chest hitching, and Heero tightened his arms around him because he needed this, needed to reach out to him. Needed to be held just as much. It had been so long since he’d held anyone, and to his embarrassment, he found that he was _starved_ for it.

“Sorry. I’m a mess. I’m usually better at pulling it together.”

“Is this too much?”

“Don’t let go of me.”

“Okay. Okay.”

The music still surrounded them, but Heero could hear his heart pounding, and he zeroed in on the rush of Quatre’s pulse where the blond’s head was pressed against his neck. Heero continued to stroke his hair, and he heard Quatre’s sigh, felt him stroking his back in return, exploring the line of his vertebrae.

“Thanks.”

“Sure, Q.” They remained there for a while.

“Fei gets weird about my scar.”

“It’s a _scar._ ” Heero was incredulous.

“Sometimes he just stares at it when we’re talking. When he touches it, it’s like, when you find a bruise on an apple.”

Heero struggled with that one. “Q?”

“Uh-huh?”

“Maybe he doesn’t realize he’s doing it.”

“I don’t know.” He took a cleansing breath and shifted, and Heero gently released him.

His body felt bereft of the contact. Quatre looked like a wreck, face blotchy, eyes still so sad.

“It’s just one more thing that he finds wrong with me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” Heero corrected him.

“Well, something’s _wrong._ ”

Heero had nothing to offer in response. He went back to work on the portrait, then took a breather.

“I think I have what I need for mine, for now.”

“Okay.”

“Let’s work on yours.”

“Ugh…”

“C’mon. Let’s roll with it. What’s giving you the most trouble?”

“Which part? All of them.”

“You’ve got the basic figure,” Heero told him. “Super saiyan mode and all.” 

Quatre laughed. “I still love that pose. So, anyway, I can almost get the proportions of your face right.” Heero nodded in agreement. “Eyes are hard for me.”

“They can be. It’s hard to make them symmetrical.”

“Yeah. And yours are kind of hooded, I can’t really describe it. You tilt your face down and look up at people a lot.”

Heero _did_ do that. “Habit. I guess.”

“Are you bashful?”

“I’m not always the most social guy around.”

“Sure aren’t.” Quatre smirked, and Heero gave him a little shove.

“There aren’t a lot of people I can be myself around.” Quatre took up a charcoal vine and beckoned for Heero to sit this time.

“Just look directly at me,” he said. “And tilt your face down a notch. Not quite that much. And do your brow thing.”

“My ‘brow thing?’” Heero gave him a look. “What ‘brow thing?’”

“That one. You’re doing it now. It’s cute, you just always do this ‘I don’t have time for your shit’ look. Oh, my God, that’s totally it!” he said. “Just… just hold it. That’s perfect.”

Quatre worked on the portrait. Heero held the expression as long as he could, told Quatre he needed a break for a minute, then went back to it when asked if he was good. Quatre seemed more relaxed, and he went back and periodically corrected lines, made adjustments to things like the height of Heero’s ears, the tilt of his chin, adding shading to the column of his throat, dusting on a faint hint of shadow beneath the tip of his nose. 

It was an improvement. Heero saw himself emerging from the paper. “You can start adding color soon.”

“That’s the part I’ve been looking forward to.” Quatre opened up his box of Grumbachers. “Your eyes are gonna give me fits, though. I’ll never be able to match the color.”

“They’re blue,” Heero said, nonplussed.

“Cobalt,” Quatre corrected him. “Really deep cobalt.”

Heero flushed and looked down, fighting the urge to smile.

“Hey. Time got away from us again. It’s late.”

“Ooh. Wow. It is.” Heero winced. “Did you have to be somewhere, Q?”

“Not really.” 

“You just look like you’re dressed for an evening out.”

“I didn’t have any plans with ‘Fei,” he explained. “Probably wouldn’t, anyway.” Heero yawned before he could reply. “Long day?”

“God, yes. I got called in to work breakfast, it’s the worst.”

“What time do you start?”

“Ass crack of dawn to set everything up. Then I went in again and worked dinner.”

“That sounds like a shit day.”

“Just those parts.”

“Heero, thank you. Thanks for making the time for me, if I haven’t said it yet.”

“I don’t mind. We both need this grade, and-“

Quatre reached for him, and Heero’s words cut off at the contact. It just felt so good. Quatre’s body was lean and taut and warm, and his arms were corded with muscle.

 _He’s taken,_ the voices chanted in his head.

His hair smelled like sunshine.

_He’s taken._

He felt safe, wrapped up in his embrace, and he was so hungry for it. So lonely.

_He’s TAKEN._

His arms were locked around Quatre’s narrow waist. He wondered if he could feel Heero’s heart pounding.

_Taken. Let go._

 

_I can’t._

The scrape of the door, the low, sharp click of the doorknob turning startled Heero from his stupor. “Quatre, I wondered if you were here, I’ve been texting you all…” Wufei’s voice was like a dash of cold water. The two of them sprang apart. 

“I didn’t get the messages. I was busy. I had my phone put away.” Quatre’s voice sounded hollow.

Wufei glared at Heero. Heero’s chin ratcheted up a notch. 

“Q needed help on his project,” he said.

“On the _project._ ”

Oh, how Heero wanted to hit him.

“We got a lot done. What did you need, ‘Fei?”

“What? I have to need something to text you?” His laugh was brittle.

“Of course not.”

The air in the studio felt thick. Heero’s eyes darted away from Wufei, and he crossed the room to unplug his phone from the speaker. The music cut off, and he heard the scrape of stools being moved out of the way, saw Quatre putting away the folding lamp. 

Heero stowed his supplies in his folio and crammed his phone into his pocket. “What did you accomplish? It’s not even finished,” Wufei chided. “Why not just work on it in class?”

“It’s a lot closer than it was,” Quatre informed him. “Making extra time to work on it outside of lecture made a difference.”

Wufei’s expression was calm, but his posture spoke volumes. Every muscle was tensed, and a tiny vein kept popping in and out of his neck. “See you in class, Heero,” Quatre told him, waving but not looking back as he sailed out of the room, Wufei close on his heels. Heero saw Wufei’s hand drift possessively to Q’s lower back right before the door swished closed after them.

He felt raw, rattled. His inner voices kept scolding him as he took up his belongings and made his own way out.

*

Heero slept like shit that night. 

The voices nagged at him, and he kept arguing back. _He was crying. Miserable. What was I supposed to do?_ He felt Quatre’s need for affection, so strong and obvious, the lack of it impossible to ignore. Quatre. What did he see in Wufei? 

It wasn’t that he wasn’t attractive. He was built, had sharp, even features and that tempting, glossy black hair. He was confident of the impression that he had on other people. He sure was confident of the impression that _Quatre_ made, Heero thought sourly. 

But Quatre was just so sunny, and goofy and ebullient. Charming, when he wanted to be. He had zero concept of subtlety or personal space. He had a genuine talent for putting his foot in his mouth.

But. _But._

Sometimes, he said what Heero didn’t know he needed to hear. The more often Heero worked with Quatre, or just talked to him, the easier it was to be with him. He had grown on him. Worn him down.

It hit him with stunning clarity that he had fallen for Quatre Winner.

“Fuck.” Heero groaned as he rolled over and pulled the pillow over his head.

*

He dreaded going to class. He hoped he wasn’t wearing his feelings on his sleeve.

“You look like you’re having an off day,” Relena informed him. She held out a pack of peppermint gum, but he shook his head.

“Is it next semester yet?”

“That bad, huh?” She gave him a sympathetic look. “Hey, your sketches are looking great! Even Quatre’s, he’s really improved.”

“He’s been working hard enough on it,” Heero agreed, but he felt frustrated. Quatre hadn’t shown up quite yet, and Heero was trying not to stare at his empty easel and stool and failing on a colossal scale.

“How are you two getting along? Still rocky?”

“No, we’re better, but-“

Quatre came rushing inside, looking windblown and fresh, and he was wearing what looked like a new leather jacket. He promptly took it off and draped it over an empty stool. “Hey,” he greeted them, breathless. “I ran late. ‘Fei took me out to this awesome noodle place on Main Street.”

Heero’s heart sank. “That’s nice,” he offered.

“Oh, it was!” Quatre told them, smiling bright. “We had a great time. ‘Fei gave me an early anniversary gift. He surprised me with it when he came and picked me up.” He held up the jacket. “Feel it. It’s like butter.” Relena indulged, making a smug sound as she stroked it.

“Someone’s spoiled.”

Once, Heero would have agreed.

“I am,” Quatre said. He turned to Heero. “Hey. Thanks again. For last night.”

Relena raised her eyebrows.

“No problem.” Heero pretended his Grumbachers were very, very interesting. Quatre gave him a confused look, then began telling Relena about the lunch he’d had until Dr. Johnson started the lecture.

They began adding color to their portraits. “Maybe you should hang that up. Don’t get dust on it,” Heero told him, nodding to Quatre’s coat.

“It should be fine.”

“It’s expensive. Don’t ruin it.”

“I won’t.” Quatre followed Heero’s earlier advice, and he deepened the shadows and followed his imaginary “light source.” He hummed under his breath, and Heero recognized the Nine Inch Nails song that they had listened to the night before. That chafed him. “Y’know, I still don’t think I’ll be able to match your eyes.”

“Don’t worry about it. You can always blow up the photo you have, just zoom in on the face. That might help you finish easier.”

“I want to get it right,” Quatre told him.

“It’ll be fine.”

“Could we meet again?” Quatre’s voice was hopeful.

“Q, I think you’ll be fine. I have a pretty busy schedule, and I bet you do, too. I don’t want to take you away from your… obligations.”

_From that asshole who doesn’t deserve you._

“You won’t. This _is_ one of my obligations, Heero. I want a good grade.”

Heero kept working on his colors, blending different cool, creamy tones for Quatre’s skin, working blues and pinks into his shading. “I think we covered enough ground. You’ve got the basics, Quatre.”

“But-“

“Just don’t worry. Okay?”

Heero convinced himself that Quatre didn’t look worried. Guilt and longing chewed at him.

*

Before Quatre could even take out his phone, Wufei met him in the corridor, and Heero promptly looked away. Before he got that far, Trowa loomed up in front of him, stopping him. 

“Hey. Want lunch?”

“Like what?”

“Grilled cheese truck?”

“That’s fine.”

“C’mon, then.” He saw Wufei and Quatre cruise past him, caught Quatre’s brief glance back and his small nod. Wufei’s arm tightened around his waist, and he gave him his full attention. “You look human today.”

“Huh?”

“You actually took the time to comb your hair. You even match. Wow. Who are you, and what have you done with Heero Yuy?”

“Um, shut up.”

“Eh. You look nice. Spiffier than usual.”

“It’s not really a compliment if you sound surprised.”

“It’s a pleasant surprise.” Heero elbowed him, and Trowa laughed. It was a nice sound. Heero realized he missed it.

They hit the grilled cheese food truck and ordered two loaded sandwiches, oozing and dripping with condiments. Heero bit into his with rapture, making an obscene noise. “Does nobody feed you?” Trowa asked around his own mouthful.

“Can’t help it, I’m starved. And I want something besides work food.”

“That’s not real food. You know that, right?”

“Don’t say that too loud. The residents might hear you.” Trowa almost choked on his ham and cheese. They sat out on the front lawn on top of their jackets and ate. 

“Wanna study for finals today? Library?”

“That’s fine.”

“Almost finished with your drawing project with whatshisname?”

“The portrait? Pretty close.”

“Bet you’ll be glad it’s done so you don’t have to work with that dingbat anymore.”

“Don’t call him that.”

“Why? I’ve heard you call him worse.”

“He’s, he’s not, okay? Don’t badmouth him.”

“Okaaayyyyy,” Trowa cajoled. “Easy, pal.”

Heero lost interest in the rest of his sandwich. He wrapped up the rest and closed it up in its recycled box. “We’re almost finished. He’s worried about his grade.”

“You helped him, though. That should be enough.”

Heero remembered Quatre’s plea for more help, and his own refusal, which he had hoped sounded gentle enough. 

He felt like a shitheel.

And because the world hated Heero, they saw Quatre and Wufei again, walking out of the student union building. Wufei was giving Quatre all of his attention, and they were holding hands, fingers interlaced, and Quatre looked radiant. Content.

“They’re kinda sickening,” Trowa remarked.

“Yeah,” Heero sighed. “Q’s pretty gone on the guy.”

Trowa gave Heero a jaundiced look. “Q? Is that what we’re calling him now?”

“I dunno. He likes it.”

“Wow. Doesn’t seem like a nickname kinda guy. But yeah. His boyfriend. I don’t know about that guy. Seems kind of full of himself. And they’ve been dating for a long time?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Wonder who that girl I saw him with was, then,” Trowa said. “They were out to dinner at this noodle place. She has a loud laugh. Cute, though. Really tiny, long dark hair. Hung on his every word.” Trowa turned to ask Heero another question, then frowned. “What’s wrong?”

All of the color drained from Heero’s face.

“I don’t feel so great. I’ve gotta go.”

He chucked the rest of his sandwich into a nearby can and dashed away. Trowa stared after him in confusion.

“Okay. So, that was weird.”

*

Heero was ensconced with his laptop in bed, soft music playing in an attempt to sooth his nerves. He worked on his art history take-home test and wondered why the words seemed to blur together on the page. His phone’s message alert startled him. He crawled across his bed and snagged it from the side table.

QW.

_Are you sure you can’t help me again?_

Heero sighed.

_Are you sure you need my help?_

Typing bubbles. _I’m positive. Certain. Adamantly sure of it. Completely convinced of it. Oh, God, Heero, I need your help. There. Is that sure enough?_

A laugh escaped him, and Heero shook his head. Okay. That was cute.

_And I wouldn’t mind chatting with you, too._

Oh. _What about?_

_Things. Complicated things._

Heero thought back to Trowa’s words from that afternoon. He felt tension and worry twist his insides.

_Okay. When do you want to meet?_

*

Heero wasn’t expecting to have to change back into real clothes at that hour. The studio was closed, but Heero still met Quatre at the arts building. He was wearing the leather jacket and a periwinkle scarf that brought out his eyes. Autumn was coming, and the nights were growing cooler. His fair cheeks were flushed with color and his lips were slightly chapped. Heero huddled more deeply into his fleece-lined denim jacket and tugged his beanie farther down around his ears. Quatre was leaning against the empty bike rack when Heero first showed up, looking troubled, but his face brightened when he caught sight of him. He straightened up and beckoned to him to follow him down the sidewalk. 

“Naked Café?”

“You want coffee this late?”

“They have dessert, too. I’m in the mood for a raspberry bar. Want one? My treat.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Share one with me so I don’t feel like a pig, then.”

“Pffft… whatever. Enjoy dessert. Why the fuck not?”

He wondered if that was another thing Wufei gave him a hard time about.

Quatre confirmed that for him once they got there and found a table in back again. “Wufei keeps telling me I need to go macrobiotic. He never eats sweets. I can’t live without them, though. I heart carbs.”

“Ditto. Macrobiotic, huh?”

“That’s the formal term for ‘everything tastes like shit. Kill yourself.’”

“No doubt.” Quatre was pretty careful about what he ate most of the time, anyway, Heero reasoned silently. What was the big deal if he wanted a sweet once in a while? 

“So, ‘Fei asked me to move in with him.”

Heero paused in grabbing a handful of napkins from the dispenser. His stomach dropped into his shoes. He mastered his expression. “That’s a big step.”

“Yeah. It is.”

They ordered two raspberry squares, even though Heero wasn’t sure he could manage his. Quatre also ordered them a couple of teas. Heero decided on decaf chai with milk; Quatre ordered chamomile with lemon. They sat down and Quatre unwound his scarf, shucked his jacket, and carefully laid it on the booth seat beside him.

“So, yeah. He asked me to move in. That was a surprise.”

“Bet it was.”

“I’m freaking out.”

And he was. Quatre was plowing his fingers through his hair, heedless of its careful styling. 

“This is… good news. Right?”

“It _should_ be.”

Oh.

“I don’t know what I should do.”

“What feels right? What’s your first instinct?”

Quatre stirred more sugar into his tea, then fiddled with the tea bag, jogging it up and down in the brew. “To wonder _why._ Why _now_.”

“Is it something you talked about before?”

“Not really.” He amended that. “He didn’t. I did. A while back.”

Heero sampled the raspberry bar. It tasted dry in his mouth.

“He said we should wait and see.”

“He did.”

“Yeah.”

“But he says he’s ready now.”

“Yes.”

“Wow.”

Quatre sighed. “Yeah.” He poked at the raspberry bar with his fork. “Wow.”

So many things made sense to Heero all at once. The criticism. Quatre’s doubting himself. The constant texts.

Wufei was checking up on him. Making sure he always knew where Quatre was so he wouldn’t get caught. And he was angry at Heero. Angry at the time Quatre spent with him. 

He was jealous.

And he was cheating.

Lunches. Showering Quatre with attention. Expensive, unexpected gifts.

Quatre’s voice cut into his ruminating. “I don’t want to lose him. We’ve invested so much into this relationship, Heero. I just. I feel confused. So damned confused.”

“Do whatever makes you happy, Quatre.” And he _had_ looked happy, before. Radiant. Content.

Taken.

They ate and sipped their tea. 

“You can help me again, right? So we can finish it?”

Heero was so tempted to say no. It was so hard. Even this was wrong. Quatre had a boyfriend, one who appeared to hate Heero, and now he was the unfortunate owner of a secret that could break Q’s heart. Worse, the more time he spent alone with Q, the more he wanted from those interactions that he knew he shouldn’t. Quatre’s face was expectant. Hopeful. 

How was this even his life?

“Yeah. We can finish it. Meet me tomorrow night, okay?”

Quatre’s smile was relieved. 

Heero still felt like a shitheel.

*

So, they met at the studio.

Heero plugged in his music again, which seemed to please Quatre. Quatre had his pastels laid out. He attached the lamp to the easel and turned it on. “Is this okay? Sorry about making you sit there in all that glare, but I need a good look at your eyes.”

“Whatever works for you, Q.”

He sat in the pool of harsh light, letting Quatre prompt him with the angle he wanted him to face. Quatre smiled.

“You’re gonna miss this, aren’t you?” he teased. “You’re going to have so much free time, you won’t know what to do with yourself.”

“Probably won’t.”

He felt empty.

“Hey. You have… there’s a hint of violet in your eyes. Just a little. Depends on which direction you turn.” 

“Guess I never noticed it.” Trowa never remarked on it, anyway. He never spent much time staring into Heero’s eyes, so it made sense that a detail like that would have escaped him.

“They’re amazing.”

Heero blinked.

“What?”

Quatre reached up and shoved the lamp away from him so that burning light wasn’t right in his face. “Turn this way,” Quatre said, his voice a rough rasp, and he caught Heero’s chin in his gentle grip. His turquoise eyes were dilated, and Heero huffed in surprise before Quatre’s warm lips claimed his.

Shock mingled with panic, and excitement, and a hot tingle of need that ran through his entire body at the contact, and Heero made a desperate little noise as he reached for him. Quatre cupped his face in his palms as his kiss deepened, beyond a tentative caress, where he was tasting him, breathing and drinking Heero in, eager, gentle and thorough. It took Heero a good minute and a half for him to realize that he was clinging to Quatre, clutching at him, unable to let go of him for fear that he would stop kissing him. Even his leg was hooked around Quatre’s while he sat back on his stool. He longed to wrap himself around him.

He supposed he had to breathe. “Shit.” Okay. So Heero wasn’t exactly eloquent when his mind was blown.

“Wow.” And neither was Q.

“Were we supposed to do that?”

“I did it. That was on me.” Quatre was still cradling Heero’s cheek, and he was trembling. “If that was wrong, then I’m sorry.”

“ _Are_ you sorry?” Heero’s heart was pounding out of his chest. He loosened his grip on Quatre’s shirt, preparing himself if the answer was yes.

The fear Heero felt was reflected in Quatre’s eyes. “I should be. But, I can’t be. I can’t.”

“Then don’t.”

“But…” And Heero felt true frustration and icy fear when he backed away. Quatre turned his back on him, plowing his fingers through the back of his hair. And oh, how it hurt. To just feel something inside of him leap at that first kiss, only to be knocked back down.

“We can go back to what-“

“No. We can’t.”

That was a thousand times worse than what Heero expected. To end with less than what he started with. His mouth was dry; it was difficult to make it work.

Quatre spoke for them both. “We can forget this happened. The semester is almost over. You won’t… you won’t have to worry about things being weird between us. I mean, we have different lives. You’ll hardly ever see me.”

The words came. They were like knives.

“Guess you’re right. I hope you’ll both be really happy together, Winner.”

Heero scooted back the stool roughly and grabbed his folio and jacket, but before he could make it to the door, slender, strong hands stopped him, gripping his shoulders.

“I shouldn’t have said that.”

“You said what needed to be said, Quatre.”

“You don’t even like me. Right? You never did before.”

A shaky sigh escaped Heero.

“Right? You didn’t. You avoided speaking to me and you never cracked a smile and the most I ever got was a grunt and that look that you make when you’re annoyed at me for even drawing breath. So if going back to the way we were means… that we’re not friends-“

“No. That’s not what it means. I meant what I said.” He still had his back to Quatre, avoiding looking at him, because if he did, he would fall apart. “We can be… friends.”

Because that had worked out _so_ well with Trowa, mixed signals, hurt feelings and all.

“I won’t interfere with what you have. You said it yourself. You have everything invested in your relationship. You love him, and that’s not something you throw away for a guy you barely know.” Heero’s voice remained steady.

That was when Quatre let go of him. And there it was.

“G’night, Quatre.”

Heero sped off on his bike, never looking back.

*

It took everything he had to crawl out of bed on Dr. Johnson’s due date. He went through the motions, keeping his shower short, opting for a beanie in lieu of combing his hair, bundling up in an unironed flannel and jeans that were at least clean. He added sunglasses, because his eyes looked like burnt out holes in his head. The air was brisk and cold; pretty soon Heero would opt for the bus to get back and forth from campus to avoid the worst of the elements. 

He took his time parking his bike, then wavered over his selection at the coffee cart, pretending to peruse the menu, asking about the new specials before ordering his regular. 

“Heero! HEERO! Hold on!”

Trowa was dressed sparely for the weather, in a dri-fit turtleneck and skinny jeans, eschewing head gear or a jacket. But he looked comfortable enough, and he laughed at Heero’ appearance.

“The nineties called, kiddo. They want their flannel back. This isn’t a great look.”

“I don’t have anyone to impress.”

“Okay. That’s fine. But this has ‘zero fucks left to give’ written all over it. This is anti-social, even for you, Heero.”

“M’not in the mood to deal with anyone today.”

“What’s up?”

Heero sighed, and the sound shifted into a growl of frustration.

“I’m just sick of everything, okay?”

“Drink your caffeine. Everything is better after caffeine.”

Heero obediently took a sip of his mocha. “So, I messed up.”

“With what?”

“With _who_.”

“Oh.” Trowa made them pause below the stairwell. “Who?”

“Q.”

Trowa blinked. “Wow.”

Heero threw up his hand, the gesture out of character, almost helpless.

“I mean… seriously? Quatre? The one you can’t stand? Kinda vapid and annoying? No respect for other people’s time? Has a penchant for grand entrances and an asshole boyfriend?” Then Trowa gave Heero a little shove. “That being said, he has an asshole boyfriend.”

“I know. I know that, Trowa.” Heero leaned against the edge of the rail, not caring that students making their way up the stairwell had to flow around him. “He’s probably going to move in with him.”

“So, let him-“

“He kissed me.”

“What, he just…” Trowa’s voice trailed off, and he backed away from Heero. He threw up his hands, and his laugh lacked mirth. “Okay. Wow.”

“Trowa-“

“So he _likes_ you. This isn’t one-sided.”

“It might as well be. We can still be friends-“

“Bullshit.”

Heero frowned. “Trowa, what’s this about?”

“You don’t do ‘just friends’ well, Yuy. You don’t.” Hurt gleamed in Trowa’s green eyes. “You just don’t.”

“We are.”

“Are we?”

Heero stared. Trowa was struggling. People were glaring at them in the stairwell, but neither of them could move.

“I keep hoping…”

“For what?”

“For you to finally get it. I just… I think if I keep waiting, maybe we’ll be able to make it work. I think of what I could have done before.”

“You’re thinking of that _now?_ ”

Hollow. Numb. Incredulous. Heero could barely breathe. He felt like he heard the cacophony of feet scraping against the concrete steps and student chatter and whining door hinges and clicks through a vacuum. All he saw was Trowa, struggling for words. Hurting.

Because of Heero.

“You waited til now?”

When he developed feelings for someone else, despite his attempts not to. Ill-placed ones that could complicate someone else’s relationship, even threaten it. Heero wouldn’t go down that road or be that person, but he also wouldn’t just be a convenience for Trowa. For _anyone._

If Trowa had truly wanted him, he would have gone full-tilt. Not stood around waiting and making excuses and allowing them to stagnate and fall into awkward limbo. Heero was low-maintenance, or so he told himself.

Yet he couldn’t have a low-maintenance relationship. Trowa was independent. So was he. It was fine in the scheme of things that Trowa could live without him, and his world wouldn’t end.

But Heero needed someone who felt that their world was better with him in it.

“I have to go,” he told Trowa.

“Heero, I’m sorry-“

“I know. Me, too.” He rushed up the stairwell, which was almost vacant now, because Heero was late.

*

Relena met him at the door, smiling. “Took you long enough, Heero.”

“Nice of you to join us, Mr. Yuy,” Dr. Johnson added, expression bland, but Heero could hear the annoyance in his voice. “So you just volunteered to help hang the murals in the library.”

“Sure,” he agreed. “That’s fine.”

“And I posted your grades on the portal, but if you’re old-fashioned and like paper and ink, I will write down your grade on a note at the end of class. I just want to say that I’m impressed with the amount of effort and attention to detail that went into each drawing. It’s been a pleasure to instruct all of you this semester and watch you grow as artists. I hope to see many of you in Advanced Drawing and Beginning Painting next semester, if it supports your major, or if you just want the enrichment of learning more artistic techniques.”

“He sounds like the course catalog,” Relena whispered. Heero nodded, lips quirking, but then his eyes scanned the room. “Where’s Quatre?” His stomach clenched. The blond was nowhere to be found.

Dr. Johnson went around the room in the meantime, revisiting each drawing twosome and pointing out the strengths of each drawing. He lauded Dorothy and Relena’s poses, since they managed to get a photo of the two of them together and worked on each figure separately, but then mounted them together so that Dorothy’s arm was slung over Relena’s shoulder. It was playful and cute, and both figures were easily recognizable. 

Out of curiosity, Heero’s eyes flitted to his drawing, and to Quatre’s.

He’d put his heart into every stroke of the charcoal, every pastel smudge. Quatre’s soft smile shone down on him, turquoise eyes crinkling at the corners. The small imperfection at the corner of his mouth was there, not enough to make anyone mention it, but enough for Heero to tell himself, yes. Yes, _that._ That was the mouth that kissed him, that smirked at him and teased him and laughed with abandon.

Then, he examined Quatre’s sketch of him.

Quatre had come back and made adjustments to it. He’d redone some of the proportions and angles – Heero’s arm looked properly foreshortened this time, the elbow better defined, and he could see the crest of his shoulder, it wasn’t devoured by his neck – and tweaked the contours of his face. He straightened his nose, it was the right width now. But what struck him were the eyes.

 _Cobalt._ He’d added “eye shines” and added shadows where they belonged, and he worked an almost imperceptible amount of violet into the blue – just a hint. His eyelashes looked a bit sparse; Heero wouldn’t be too critical of that, he hated drawing lashes himself, they were easy to ruin. But that was _him_. Fierce, exaggerated expression, tensed muscles, flyaway hair and all. Somehow, he’d captured grudging amusement in his expression. Was that really there the day of their shoot at the creek? Was that how he felt?

The door swung open and Quatre arrived, looking sheepish, tucking his phone into his backpack.

“Nice of you to join us, Mr. Winner,” Dr. Johnson repeated, sighing. “You’re my second volunteer. All right, here is what we will do next. Go ahead and use your exacto blade to cut out the sketch. No border. Go in tight around your lines. Spray them with your fixative first. We will roll them up and Heero and Quatre will be helping me carry those over in poster tubes. And that’s that!”

“Has he graded them yet?” Quatre blurted out.

“Portal,” Heero told him. “Or he will give you a note.”

“God, my stomach is in knots.”

“You did a great job.”

"No, I-"

“You did. I see myself in that sketch. You worked hard on it. I appreciate that.” The politeness felt heavy and strangling. He meant it, but it was hard to limit himself to the “right” things to say, when all of the wrong ones were trying to claw their way out. 

_This is how you see me. If you like me, tell me. Give whatever this is a chance, damn it. Don’t stay with him. Please._

"Okay. Cut 'em out," Dr. Johnson told them. "Let's get a move-on.” Everyone went into their toolboxes and kits and took out their blades, then began the painstaking process of cutting out the positive space, watching out for sharp interior corners. It was tedious work. 

“I hope I don’t fuck it up,” Heero heard Quatre whisper.

Heero glanced over at him. His shoulders were tense, and he was making slow progress.

“You’re doing fine. Don’t overthink it. You don’t have to dig in too deep with your blade, okay?”

Quatre sighed. “I want to do it right.”

“You will.”

Quatre gave him a brief smile, but he just seemed sad.

“We got through the semester,” Heero told him. “No more late nights.”

“True,” he murmured.

“You and ‘Fei will have a lot of free time.”

“Sure we will.” And Quatre closed himself off. It was like hearing a door slam.

Heero said nothing else. He finished cutting out his drawing quickly, and he took the tube that Dr. Johnson handed him. “Don’t roll it too tight. Otherwise it will be hard to mount.”

“That’s fine.” 

Once all of the drawings were packed into their containers for transport to the library, Heero gathered up half, and Quatre cut him a wide berth while he took the rest. It hurt. Dr. Johnson clapped his hands.

“Okay. Off we go.”

They trekked out of the building and across the lawn, past the rose garden, and Dr. Johnson held the door for them at the library, helping them through the turnstile in the lobby. The grumpy librarian treated them to a rare smile. “You’ve come to grace us with some artwork,” she said.

“That we have.” They headed upstairs to the main reference section, and Heero noticed they had already taken down the old murals. There was a faint, dusty outline where the pictures had hung, clean patches of wall now revealed, which amused him a little.

“I guess it’s too high up for anyone to mop down,” Quatre mused, echoing his thoughts. Heero snickered. “Gross.”

“Yeah.”

They got up on the ladders – or rather, Heero did, since Quatre wasn’t comfortable on them, and Dr. Johnson had back issues – and they helped hand him small pieces of mounting putty, safer to the walls than tape. Heero managed to hang three of them before he began to get a crick in his neck.

“You okay?” Quatre inquired. 

“M’fine.” Heero went to work on the fourth as Quatre handed it up to him. It was the one of Dorothy. That one had to be hung first, since her elbow was reached behind Relena in the photo. It was so well done, and he handled it gingerly so Lena wouldn’t kill him. He had half of it tacked up when he noticed a slight ripple. He would need to go back and do it over, anchoring smaller areas at a time.

“Hey, could I get some more taaaYYYYP!!!!” He lost his footing on the metal rung.

“SHIT!”

Heero’s body reverberated with the sensation of pitching back and flying through the air, twisting around to try to catch himself and failing miserably. He heard Quatre’s dismayed curse, right before he landed smack against him, knocking him over.

Dr. Johnson hurried forward. “Have a nice trip?” he joked as he went to help them up. The pun was terrible, but his eyes were filled with real concern.

Quatre was beneath him, looking dazed. “You okay?” Heero reached for him, clasping his shoulder. That was when he noticed that Quatre was clutching him, in a grip that felt protective. Heero flushed all the way up to his ears.

“Stellar. Ow…”

“You should have moved.”

“You scared the crap out of me,” he said softly. 

“Okay. Maybe I’ll take a turn on the ladder, this time,” Dr. Johnson suggested.

“It’s okay, I can do the rest,” Heero insisted.

“No. I’ll call the maintenance crew,” the librarian told them, and Heero felt ridiculous. He was still on the floor. Still pressed against Quatre.

“Can’t remember the last time someone fell for me like that,” Quatre muttered.

“That was terrible,” Heero told him as he helped him up.

Yet he couldn’t stop the smirk that pulled at his lips.

*

Heero was impatient about this grade. He asked Dr. Johnson for his grade on his way out of the studio once he’d returned to retrieve his things. “You didn’t even have to ask me, Mr. Yuy. I gave you an A. Drawing comes pretty easily to you. I’d also like to tell you that I gave you extra credit for class participation when you helped Mr. Winner with his drawing. That was admirable. I’m sure he appreciated it. That’s great teamwork.”

Heero ducked his face at the praise. “We worked well together, once we got used to each other’s habits.”

“Good! So, see you next semester?”

“Yep.”

“I didn’t notice Mr. Winner enrolled in any of my sections so far.”

Heero’s heart sank.

*

The next day, Heero just felt numb. The weather didn’t help. It was blistering and cold, and the rain was coming down sideways. The forecast warned that they were in for snow in another week. Heero wasn’t looking forward to a higher heating bill.

His mother sent him a Christmas card. He didn’t read anything into it or get his hopes up. _We’re going to Grandma May’s for Christmas Eve. Here’s a little something so you can treat yourself._ It was a pre-loaded Visa gift card. _Fair enough._ Dad wouldn’t question it the way he would a check that cleared their account.

He wore a white turtleneck under his work shirt to stave off the chill in the front serving area. The residence hall was notoriously drafty, and he had to make several trips outside to break down boxes and help unload the food truck. Heero got his class schedule in the mail and a letter stating he had to have his tuition paid by the fifteenth, right after intersession started. His mother’s gift card would buy him one textbook. 

Quatre wasn’t enrolled in any of his art classes. That spoke volumes. Heero kept himself busy in an attempt not to dwell on it. He found himself bullshitting with Duo about the latest Call of Duty and Assassin’s Creed games. Duo invited him to come home with him for the holiday. “Beats being alone.”

“I’m used to it.”

“Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck.”

“It’s not that bad. I’m not about yuletide cheer and roasting chestnuts and all that other shit, anyway.”

“No chestnuts. Just alcohol.” Heero chuckled. “Aunt Helen spikes the egg nog every year, no matter how often my dad tells her to stop.”

“Nice.”

“HEERO!”

He looked up from the box he was stepping on to flatten it, and it was Quatre, hurrying across the lot and heading toward the loading dock ramp. His cheeks were flushed, and Heero noticed that his eyes were red. He was wearing a heavy sweater, no jacket in sight, and certainly not the plush black leather one Wufei had given him for their anniversary. He stopped short of the ramp, nodding and giving a weak wave to Duo, who nodded back.

“Hey, bro,” Duo offered.

“Hey. Heero, can I talk to you for a minute? I was hoping you’d be here.”

Duo took that as his cue to leave.

Heero pulled up a couple of milk crates and motioned for Quatre to sit down. Quatre sank down onto it, letting his hands dangle down between his knees.

“Um. So. Today’s kind of a bad day.” His sigh was ragged, and Heero resisted the urge to touch him. “Wufei and I broke up.”

“Okay.” Heero didn’t know what to say. His feelings were roiling inside him, but chief among them was empathy, because this… he was witnessing heartbreak. 

“Yeah. We split up. I guess I should have seen it coming. I’m an idiot.”

“No.”

“I am,” Quatre argued, nodding, clutching at his hair. “I should have known. I ignored the signs. I ignored my instincts because I cared about him so much.”

Past tense.

“So, I was in the quad, and this really tall guy with brown hair and green eyes comes up to me. He hands me this bracelet. It was a gold link ident bracelet that I had engraved for him for his birthday.” Quatre took a shaky breath. “I asked him where he found it. He said, at the noodle place downtown. The one where ‘Fei took me. I was glad that he brought it back, it was nice of him to take the time to ask me about it. I don’t even know how he knew that ‘Fei and I were dating, and he actually told me, ‘I saw you around.’”

 _Trowa._ Heero’s world tilted, and he felt his pulse speed up.

“So, I thanked him, and for some reason, I just had this weird urge, right after he handed it to me. I don’t know, it was just this weird instinct to know how he knew ‘Fei. And I said, ‘When did you see Wufei?’ He just kind of shrugged his shoulders and said ‘The other night.’ I said, ‘So, Tuesday?’ and he said ‘Yeah.’ So, that kind of confused me, because he was working that night. He got called in to work on a presentation for the next day. He got mad at me because I questioned him about it. We’d made plans, and he all of the sudden cancelled them.”

“So, I asked him about it. I gave him back the bracelet, and he said he didn’t even remember when he wore it last. That hurt, because I took a lot of time thinking about what to get him for a gift.”

 _Asshole._ Heero kept that to himself. What was _wrong_ with Wufei? How was he so crass?

“And then, then, Heero, he just, he started going off on how I was nosy and asking a lot of stupid questions, and that I didn’t appreciate him or respect how hard he worked, while I’m just dicking around with electives I don’t need and wasting time on an art project that didn’t mean anything. He said ‘you’re a shitty artist, anyway.’

So, I felt like crap, and we shouted at each other for an hour. I think my neighbors weren’t too happy.” Quatre wiped his eyes on his sleeve, and oh, how Heero wanted to touch him, reach out to him in some way. “And he stormed out. And I was upset. And you know, he carries two phones. He left his work phone behind.”

Heero’s gut knotted. “So, I took it and locked myself in my bedroom with it. My heart was pounding. I never check his phone. I just had this weird, sick feeling. Once, he got a text in the middle of the night. It woke me up out of a dead sleep. He told me to go back to bed. He wouldn’t tell me who it was. So that was burning a hole in my brain. I went through his messages. There were over a hundred of them. So, most of them were work stuff, but I saw a whole bunch of them that were from someone named ‘M.’ So I opened one. It said ‘I can’t stop thinking about you. Can’t wait to see you again.’ And it was like someone punched me in the stomach, Heero.”

Heero swallowed. “I bet.”

“Yeah. So… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be bringing this to your doorstep.”

“It’s okay.”

“I needed someone to talk to.”

“You can. You can talk to me.”

“I know. So, anyway, there were a lot of messages that said more of the same thing. ‘Thanks for dinner. Still didn’t taste as good as you do. Been thinking of you, especially a certain part of you.’ There were pictures. Tacky bathroom selfies. Some of them were naked. She was spread-eagled in one, and the thought occurred to me that someone else probably took it. I found that one in his saved photos.”

_Shit._

“I’m so sorry, Q.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

“Q. He shouldn’t have said those things.”

“I was an idiot. I let this happen. Maybe I deserved them.”

“No.”

Heero reached for his wrist, cradling it and rubbing it with his thumb, his strokes feather-light.

“Quatre. Q. Listen to me. You don’t deserve anything hurtful that he told you. Not at all.” Quatre wiped his eyes with his free hand, and a clear drop of snot dripped from his nose; he wiped that on his sleeve, and his face was blotchy. He looked about ten years younger and so vulnerable, so heartbroken.

“Some of the pictures were almost a year old.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“You don’t have to be, it’s not your fault,” Quatre reasoned, and Heero adjusted his grip so that he was holding his hand.

“No. I’m sorry he hurt you.”

“And y’know the funniest part? He had the nerve to be jealous. Any time any other guy ever talked to me, or offered me a ride home, or approached me when we went out, he would get weird about it. He’d grill me about who were they, and how did I know them, and why were they looking at me like that?”

“He accused you first. So you wouldn’t think to accuse him.”

“Okay.”

“I texted him. I told him I knew about Meilin. That’s her name. So, he didn’t come home until late, but he blew up my phone with a whole bunch of texts. Just nothing but lies. I was just sitting there in shock when he finally came over. He just gave me a bunch of excuses. Told me it was my fault, but then tried to tell me that I was the one he really cared about. He kept changing his story. I told him I couldn’t move in with someone so dishonest. That he stabbed me in the back, and that I didn’t think he ever loved me. Even though it hurt, to hear myself saying that. I don’t. I don’t want it. To be. True.”

His halting words trailed off into a gusty sob, and he covered his eyes with his hand. 

“You were the only person I felt like I could tell.” 

He let go of Quatre’s hand. “You can tell me anything you want.” Quatre was sitting too far away from him for Heero’s taste. He slid off his milk crate, down onto his knees, and he knelt between Quatre’s spread knees, earning himself Quatre’s bewildered look.

“What are you- oh. Okay.” He groaned at the feel of Heero’s arms wrapping around him, and he tightened his own, clutching at him and clinging for dear life. Out in the open, on the loading dock ramp. With the wind blowing around them and raindrops spattering them where the overhang didn’t quite cover them. Heero wanted to be nowhere else. He felt Quatre’s heart beat and listened to his rough, hitched breathing and breathed in the scents of his laundry detergent and shampoo, the natural, warm scent of his skin. He stroked his back, and he felt Quatre remove his work cap and run his fingers through his hair.

“Tell me if this isn’t okay.”

“Don’t let go of me yet.”

“Okay.”

And Heero was selfish, too, because that’s what he’d hoped Quatre would say. He didn’t want to let go of him. Ever. Even if his knees were going numb against the cold concrete, even if he was getting a crick in his neck from the awkward angle, but Quatre was so warm and solid and felt so right in his arms. His mind was reeling. Quatre wasn’t moving in with ‘Fei. Part of him was bursting with happiness, but he couldn’t tell Q that. Not now.

“I think you knew I wasn’t happy. I thought I was, before. ”

“That wasn’t for me to decide.”

“I wasn’t. Everything’s so crazy.”

“Okay. It’s okay, Q.”

“You feel good.”

“So do you. Please don’t cry.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I’m a mess right now.”

“That’s not it. It just hurts to see you sad.” That earned him a short, wet laugh, and more caresses of those sensitive fingers through his hair.

“That’s all I’ve been, lately. I must be a real drag to be around, Heero.”

He drew back, reluctantly, and stared up into Quatre’s face. “All I can think about, lately, is how I can’t wait to see you again. I have to tell you something. I’m kind of an ass. I’m not a people person. I don’t do ‘feelings.’” He pronounced it with quotes around it. “I say the wrong thing a lot. It gets worse when I’m lonely, because I end up pushing people away. I’m not a great friend.”

“You are, too,” Quatre insisted, but he was staring at him, paying Heero avid attention. He touched his cheek. The gesture took Heero back to the studio, when Q had kissed him.

“I’m not. But I was scared to death when you just wanted to go back to how things were, when we weren’t friends. I didn’t want-“

“What didn’t you want?

“To lose you.”

“Hey, Heero, Howard says he wants you to come…serve.” Duo’s words drifted off at the scene before him. “Y’know, when the two of you are done making out?”

Heero barely heard him. Duo’s words were muffled by the sound of Quatre’s – and his own – staggered breaths between kisses, and God help him, Heero realized, that was _him_ making those low moaning, humming sounds of need, and somehow he’d ended up on Quatre’s lap, giving his knees a reprieve. His lips were soft and hot, and he tasted sweet when Heero explored the confines of his mouth.

Heero didn’t care if he got _fired._

* 

He gave Quatre his address via text, and when his shift was roughly due to end. There was a lot to do, and the cafeteria had been crowded that night. Quatre had been shy, fingers toying with Heero’s hand until Heero laced them together. He felt the cool, hard bands of Quatre’s silver rings and the comforting beat of his pulse.

“I have to go to ‘Fei’s to give him back his stuff.”

“Do you need help?” 

Quatre shook his head. “I’ll manage it. Usually he’s working right about now. Or so he’s told me before.” Quatre sighed. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

Heero reached up and cupped his nape and pulled him down for a soft kiss, and that brought back his smile. “You don’t have to stay home, climbing the walls by yourself. We can talk.”

“I’d like that.”

Quatre arrived an hour after Heero got off work, looking rattled and tired, but he kissed Heero as soon as he crossed the threshold, and they just lingered there a minute, taking their time with the greeting.

“You taste good,” Quatre murmured against his lips.

“I just drank a root beer.”

“I love root beer.”

He claimed Heero’s mouth in a kiss that made flames lick up all over his body, greedy and deep. Heero told himself that this wasn’t prudent. Not in the least. Quatre just broke off a long-term relationship, and the wound was still raw. He broke the kiss with extreme difficulty, pulling back in Quatre’s arms, and they were both out of breath. Quatre’s pupils were dilated, and he looked confused.

“You’re stopping. Why?”

“Is this too soon? Is this all right?”

Quatre closed his eyes, groaning in frustration. “You’re not supposed to ask me that.”

“Is it? Too soon?” Heero rephrased, even though he wanted to give in to the pull of Quatre’s kisses, of his hands that were gripping him, caressing him, slipping under the hem of Heero’s shirt.

“No.”

“This isn’t just a distraction?”

“No.” Quatre leaned in for another kiss, and Heero moaned at how good it felt, how tempting it was just to go with it.

“Shouldn’t we talk? You came here to talk?”

“Can we talk from the couch?” 

Heero chuckled, and Quatre’s smile was wicked.

“As long as your hands stay above the waist.” Quatre tsked in disappointment, then grinned again.

“ _Fine._ ”

Easier said than done.

They started on the couch, upright but leaning in close, exchanging periodic, tiny kisses as they watched episodes of Game of Thrones. They chatted about mundane things, how life was before they were each out. Their parents. The loneliness of having a stable of sisters and being the only boy, versus having no siblings at all. The next semester’s offerings that they planned to add to their schedules.

“No more drawing?” Heero inquired.

“I have a full docket of classes that actually apply to my major. I’m gonna be swamped.”

“So I might not see much of you,” Heero reasoned.

“You might,” Quatre mused. “Bet I can make time to fit you in.”

“You can fit me in?”

The look on Quatre’s face was smoldering, and Heero realized how it must have sounded, but before he could amend his words, Quatre was kissing him, hard and thirsty and demanding, and Heero made an obscene, needy noise in response. 

“I can,” Quatre breathed over his lips as he nipped at them, Heero’s face framed in his hands. His kisses trailed a line from his cheek, down his jaw, lingering at his throat for a moment before painting it with heat. And Heero’s neighbors were going to hate him, because what Quatre was doing with his tongue didn’t lend itself to him staying quiet. Heero’s fingers clutched at Quatre’s blond waves, tugging on it, guiding his face lower to give his collarbones some attention.

 _Hands above the waist._ The concept was laughable, and only possible as long as they had on so much as a stitch of clothing.

So many weeks of wondering how it would feel to hold him close and breathe him in. Heero didn’t object when jerked the hem of his shirt from his waistband, giving him access to his taut abdomen and his feverish skin. “You’re hot. You’re so damned hot, Heero.”

“No…no. Uh-uh. You are, Q.”

“No. You.” And Quatre found his nipples, barely grazing them as he kissed Heero, making him moan and strain into his touch. 

“This- this isn’t just because of what happened? Because you’re sad things didn’t work out with him?”

That gave Quatre pause. Then he shook his head.

“No. This is because I’ve found you attractive and talented and funny and smart and absolutely terrible with how much you close yourself off from everyone. That made me want to know you. As your friend, when it seemed like you weren’t gonna let me.” He ran his hands down Heero’s sides. “Then as something else when I realized what it was that I was feeling. I knew Wufei wasn’t happy with me, but this isn’t about him. My being here with you isn’t because I’m not with him anymore. It’s because I want to be with _you_.”

“Not because it’s convenient.”

“No. Hell, no, Heero. Believe me, I _want_ you so bad.”

"Then you’d better do something about all these clothes.”

“Like, throw them on the floor?”

“That should work.” And Heero closed in on him, claiming his mouth, crawling into his lap and straddling him. Heero made short work of Quatre’s shirt buttons, nearly tearing it in his haste, jerking the tails out of his jeans, feeling the rush of cool air against his skin as Quatre jerked his work shirt over his head.

“Look at you,” Quatre murmured. “You’re gorgeous, Heero.” Heero shook his head, flushing, trying to fight the smile, but Quatre traced a line down his chest, then teased his nipple, and a snicker escaped him.

“Tickles.”

“Shut up and kiss me.” 

“Jerk.” And the kisses were so lazy and thorough, and the rest of their clothes fell away, kicked off in a trail from the couch to the bedroom. Heero hit the wall switch, turning on the soft wattage lamp in the corner. 

“Good,” Quatre told him. “I want to see you.”

“I just turned on a light so I could find the lube,” he countered, shrugging. With that, Q tackled him, and Heero was still snickering as they scooted back onto the bed, and it felt like heaven, being skin on skin. Quatre kissed him everywhere, touched his aching, lonely flesh. Heero was so starved for contact and for affection, something he would never admit. Being stoic meant that people thought you were untouchable. Quatre kissed his way down his chest and latched onto one of his nipples, teasing and nipping at it, then sucking it into his hot mouth, no longer gentle, and Heero tugged on that glorious, soft hair again. Quatre teased both of them into hard, rosy little buds, driving him out of his mind. Quatre’s hands stroked over his ribcage, silently measuring his waist, and Heero huffed when he nipped at his belly, then dipped his tongue into his navel, swirling over it in tiny circles.

Heero was hard as a rock, throbbing, the tip of his cock leaking with need. Quatre descended over it, breathed over it and it jerked up to meet his lips. They were barely touching him, and Heero groaned, hips jerking toward that heat, but Quatre held his hips down. Then he lapped a trail along the tender frenulum underneath. Heero’s eyes shuddered, and he stopped caring about things like neighbors or the volume of his voice or restraint. Quatre teased more little circles around the engorged head, then took Heero into his mouth. Quatre moaned in pleasure at the feel of him, his taste on his tongue. It was erotic, watching his face descend over him, pulling him into his heat. His cheeks were sucked in, emphasizing the crowns of his cheekbones and the elegant line of his jaw. In the soft light, Heero saw the crescent shadows of Quatre’s thick lashes. He memorized his face from so many weeks of watching him, staring intently at those pictures of Quatre in the dappled sunlight on the bridge. Wishing that he didn’t already have someone who didn’t appreciate him. Wishing he could understand what he felt for what it was instead of spending so long letting them both hurt. And want.

“Please. Want you. God, Q. Feels too good. Gonna come.”

“Not yet. Not til you’re in me.”

And if that didn’t do Heero in…

Quatre wasn’t quick to release him. He pushed Heero to the brink, then backed off of him, lapping up the hint of his salty essence and the slickness he’d left behind. “Lube?”

“Drawer.” Heero caught his breath, still reeling amongst the pillows and rumpled sheets. He heard the slide of the runners in his side table and Quatre produced the bottle, still embarrassingly full. Quatre didn’t remark on it; if anything, he looked pleased, even smug.

He pulled Heero up, then devoured his mouth where he straddled his lap. Heero stroked him, the smooth, taut length of his tapered, hard thighs, his narrow hips, and Quatre clung to him, grinding down against him, and he was hard, too. Leaking and desperate for Heero to take him.

Heero didn’t even remember opening the bottle or slicking his fingers or setting it back on the side table. All he knew was the furtive slip of his finger into Quatre’s crease, the soft noise of need he made as he stroked his pucker. He kneaded it teasingly before pressing it inside. Quatre welcomed him with a soft squeeze of his muscles, then relaxed enough to let him in more deeply, and his face went slack with pleasure. “God, Heero…”

“Easy, Q. Wanna make it good for you.”

“You are. You are.” His voice was strained as Heero’s finger twisted and probed, stroking him with so much care. Heero’s kisses never stopped, nor did Quatre’s hips where he kept grinding himself down. They were still both leaking and hot, enjoying the subtle friction he created. Heero eased a second finger inside him, giving him a gentle stretch, and Quatre’s breath shuddered out of him. He was grinding down against those fingers, pushing himself down greedily to steal more of the sensation, and he cried out when Heero found his sweet spot, twisting his fingers to massage it. “So. Close. Heero. Oh, God, Heero…”

“I want to see how you take it,” Heero whispered. “M’gonna make you come for me. Come all over me, Q.” Quatre nodded, eyes dark with lust before he buried his face in Heero’s neck. He was ready for another finger, and he tensed at first when Heero slid it inside, but his cries told him what he needed to know. Quatre reached between them and grasped their cocks in the column of his fingers and continued to thrust against Heero while Heero primed him.

“Now. Now, Heero, now…” His voice cut off when Heero let his fingers slip free, and Quatre was anxious until Heero gripped his hips, guided him over his cock, then helped lower him down in short, even thrusts, until he was impaled all the way to the root. Heero reeled with the pleasure of being engulfed by him, and he sagged back onto his back, watching Quatre where he was looming over him.

“So good. You feel so good, Q.” He was snuggled around him, hot and snug, squeezing him and making him forget all reason. Quatre ground against him, and Heero began to thrust his hips up into his heat. “S’good. Q, it’s so good.” Quatre’s face. He looked amazing in the throes of passion, muscles taut and gleaming with sweat, like a Roman sculpture come to life. He lifted and thrust down, over and over, hands planted on Heero’s chest. Heero ran his hands down his arms, feeling the relief map of veins and tendons beneath the flawless skin, kneading the masculine, generous curves of his shoulders as Quatre rode him. Quatre’s pace sped up, and Heero’s legs were bridging him up, the thrusts growing more intense, anything to bury himself inside him. Anything to stay connected to him. To get lost in him.

They moved as a unit, their rolling movements making the mattress squeak and threatening the plaster in the walls. “More,” Quatre rasped. He was thrusting down hard, but Heero felt his pace falter; his leg had to have a cramp. That wouldn’t do.

“M’gonna take care of you. C’mon, Q. Roll over. Take a breather.”

“You don’t have to- oh.” Quatre groaned in approval when Heero wrapped his arms around him and rolled them both so that Quatre was on his back, still interlocked. Heero leaned down until he was flush against him just to taste him again and let him catch his breath. His thrusts were gentle, shallow while he nibbled on his ear, his throat. He was so responsive. Trowa could be sweet. Fierce. He got the job done. But Quatre treated sex like it was a religious experience, alternating between vigorous and rough, and intimate and tender. Quatre bucked up against him, wanting him to bring them back to pace, but Heero continued to slow, sweet strokes, keeping Quatre’s erection trapped between their sweaty bodies. Quatre wrapped his legs around Heero’s ribs, a clear signal that he was ready for more.

“Please,” he grunted. “C’mon, Heero. Please.”

“So polite,” Heero teased, but his eyes smoldered down on his lover. He retracted further, driving in harder with each thrust, and Quatre became incoherent, eyes rolling shut from the pleasure as Heero found his prostate. He took complete advantage of it, and Quatre continued to dribble pre-cum from his reddened, swollen cock. His breathing was uneven, rough gasps at best as he kept chanting Heero’s name, how good he felt, and when Quatre told him, without any doubt of his intent, to _Pound my fucking ass, Heero!_ that was all he needed. Heero adjusted the angle, lifted Quatre’s legs over his _shoulders_ , nearly bending him in half, and he did what he was told. Faster. Harder. More intense. Heero’s body was flushed and dripping with sweat as he pistoned his hips, driving into Quatre and feeling his balls slap his supple ass. Quatre’s head was tipped back into the pillow, hands twisting it into knots, and he was crying out curses and prayers, voice rising. Heero was straining, muscles burning with his efforts as he pushed them both over the edge.

“Touch it. Touch yourself, Quatre. Let me watch you.” Heero leaned in and grabbed Quatre’s wrist, urging him to let go of the pillow, and he guided his hand toward his erection while he continued to thrust. “I want to watch you do it.” Quatre’s hand trembled as he caught hold of it and began to loosely pump. “That’s it, Q. That’s it. You’re sexy when you do that.”

Quatre’s grip was unsteady, then firm as he pumped himself harder, faster, building up friction, and he moaned and cried out. “Heero… God, Heero, m’gonna come… oh, God, make me come, let me come, Heero…”

“It’s okay, Q,” Heero told him. “It’s okay.” Heero’s last few thrusts pounded into him, and Quatre fell over the brink, hips spasming as his climax roared through him, pouring from him in slick, hot spurts. His seed decorated their bellies, pooling in the sandy blond curls covering his sex. Heero rode him through it, and Quatre’s hand jerked, milking out the rest, down to the last thick fissure. His body jerked, face suffused with pleasure, and his body was so flushed with color… he was glowing. Replete and love drunk, staring up at Heero in bliss. A sleepy smile curled his lips. Heero turned his face and kissed Quatre’s knee, making him shiver. Quatre wiped his fingers off on his belly, grimacing for a second, and then he chuckled.

“Nice talk,” he teased. Heero kissed his other knee, stroking the length of his thighs. Heero’s cock pulsed inside him, and Quatre realized that Heero hadn’t come yet. “Heero…c’mon. Seriously??”

“Almost there, Q.”

“Oh, God…”

Mock horror flitted over Quatre’s face, then amusement as Heero began to thrust again, back to the soft, shallow thrusts, and slowly, Quatre’s cock began to twitch back to life. “There’s something wrong with you,” Quatre accused.

“I want to see that look on your face again. I wanna hear you make more of those noises. It’s hot when you do that.”

“Heero…” Heero lengthened his thrusts and let his hands slide down Quatre’s thighs to his hips, holding them where he wanted them, and he felt his balls aching to come. He was so close, and Quatre was mewling, half-sobbing as Heero pushed him toward another climax. He lowered Quatre’s legs, since they were beginning to tremble, and he lowered himself to his forearms and thrust in earnest. Quatre eased his legs back around his ribs, rocking up against him in return, and he drank greedy kisses from Heero’s mouth, letting him swallow his moans. Heero felt himself nearing the edge of his pleasure, and he reared up, changing the angle, and the veins stood out in his neck and arms. He jerked and thrust and shuddered until his orgasm rolled through him like a wave, filling his lover’s channel with his seed. Quatre’s voice died on a choked cry, his face a rictus of pleasure-pain as he came _again_ , clutching and rocking against Heero.

They collapsed, spent and gasping, a limp puddle of limbs. It was a struggle just to catch their breath. Quatre had shouted himself hoarse, and Heero had sweated every drop of moisture out of his body. Somehow, Quatre found some reserve of strength that allowed him to wrap his arms around Heero, tucking his head against his neck. Heero felt his drumming pulse and purred under his hands. He felt boneless. Content.

“I can’t move my legs.”

“Me, either.”

“Okay. It’s not just me.”

“You’re good at that. Just thought… I’d mention that.”

“I’m listening.”

“You’re hot as _hell_.”

Heero caressed Quatre, just soft little patterns over his skin, and he leaned up to kiss his chin. “There’s only one hot person in this room, and he makes a nice pillow.” Quatre chuckled, hugging him, and Heero sighed. He was so happy.

“Which side of the bed do you like to sleep on?” Heero inquired.

Quatre huffed, and Heero felt him shrug. He experienced a moment of panic. 

What if he didn’t want to stay? Trowa never wanted to.

“The left, Heero. But whichever one you want me on is fine with me.”

And just like that, Quatre had him.

 

FIN.


End file.
